An overview of coal bed methane potential in Polish coal basins

Abstract

History of hard coal mining in Upper Silesia, started in the mid‐seventeenth century, which is confirmed in documents from 1657. On its site operated the open‐pit mine in Murcki, where the first coal mine shaft was built and underground coal mining started in 1755. Nowadays, after consolidation with KWK Staszic in 2010, and since then hard coal mine has operated as Murcki‐Staszic, in the Katowice Coal Holding SA structure [1]. First coal mine in Lesser Poland District was established in 1767 in Szczakowa – nowadays in Jaworzno district [2]. Despite of long time experience in the Polish mining industry, methane associated with coal seams (CMM‐coal‐mine methane) was considered as a serious problem in coal exploration [3]. During the hard coal mine operation, methane together with wasted air was removed directly to the atmosphere through ventilation system, causing an increase in greenhouse gases (GHG) [4]. European Union adopted policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Implementation of this policy causes an additional costs for mining company (related to methane emission). Ventilation methane content and methane drainage is shown in Figure 1. Based on experience of USA, China and Australia, also in Poland, started to looking for the possibility to extract methane from coal beds. Due to US investors interest to perform assessment of methane extraction possibility from Polish coal basins, the first pilot projects has been performed in the early 90s of twentieth century. Performed research were mostly based on a review of collected geological information and laboratory tests on samples taken from geological exploration drilling in the Upper Silesian Coal Basin.