Environmental campaigners, in an unlikely alliance of interests with Russian gas-export monopoly OAO Gazprom, have also held up investment in the shale industry. Chevron had its license revoked in Bulgaria last year after hundreds protested in Sofia over concerns fracking would pollute water and land.
A report in the corporate Gazprom Magazine said prospects for shale are undermined by lower reserves estimates, green protests and the harm to profits of low gas prices. “Europeans have no real alternative to cooperation with Russia,” it concluded.
That possibility hasn’t stopped Chevron. On top of three wells in Poland, the second-biggest U.S. oil company plans an exploration well in Romania, has begun work in Lithuania and been awarded a 1.6 million-acre license in Ukraine.
“While the shale gas revolution may not be on the same scale as what we have seen in the U.S., we are still confident of the opportunities,” MacDonald said by e-mail. “Unlike the U.S., in central Europe there’s little pre-existing geological data. The exploration activities we are currently undertaking will be important in assessing the resource potential.” Chevron is pledging to explore for as long as five years, he said.
That commitment is winning support from some governments.
“Romania, Poland and Lithuania are in favor of shale gas as these countries see the natural gas problem as more than just an issue of getting cheaper energy,” Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta said on July 18. “It’s important for us to have cheaper energy, especially because of its impact on the economy and the population, but more so to stop relying on imports from Russia, from Gazprom.”
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