San Leon Energy is gearing up to drill a horizontal well in Poland, targeting commercial production from the Baltic Basin following success this year with a vertical fracture that has provided insight into what could be promising Ordovician shales.

“Engineering, planning and permitting is well advanced. The timing of the well will be partly driven by incorporation of the results of the current hydraulic fracturing and testing activities by other companies on two of the nearby licenses,” Joel Price, COO for San Leon Energy, told E&P.

The Dublin-based company is one of several companies that have refused to give up on Poland’s shale potential. Others pushing forward with exploration plans include 3Legs Resources and its partner ConocoPhillips as well as BNK Petroleum, which both have interest in concessions in the Baltic Basin, as well as Chevron Poland, which has interests in shale formations in southeast Poland in partnership with state-owned Polish Oil & Gas Co. (PGNiG). A lack of immediate success and sometimes redirected focus prompted other companies, including ExxonMobil, Marathon Oil and Talisman Energy, to ditch their plans last year.

But San Leon, which acquired Talisman’s interest in the Baltic Basin, marked a milestone when its Lewino-1G2 vertical well on the Gdansk W concession flow tested at a sustained gas production rate of between 45,000 scf/d and 60,000 scf/d (1,274 cm/d and 1,699 cm/d) after the final frack.

“The original vertical well, Lewino-1G2, required three attempts at fracking before we had a breakthrough in design,” Price said. “That has been the most challenging aspect so far.”

The first attempt yielded improved proppant concentration, but not viable enough for sustained production, according to SIGMA³—part of the team including United Oilfield Services, which provides hydraulic fracturing services for San Leon.

Applying knowledge gained from this stage and techniques applied to U.S. shale wells, the team fracked again, “pumping through a new set of perforations, with a plug above the lower zone to isolate the upper Ordovician from the previously fractured lower zone,” SIGMA³ said on its website.

“After testing two frack strategies in the lower Ordovician, [San Leon’s] objective for the stimulation program in the upper shale interval was to prove the ability to fracture and enable sustained production,” SIGMA³ said in a prepared statement. “The same strategies would then be applied to a multistage stimulated horizontal well in the lower Ordovician—which has superior gas saturation and porosity— intended to open the upper and lower intervals and deliver consistent commercial flow rates.”

Using available flowback data, SIGMA³ performed dynamic simulation modeling to determine the permeability of the upper formation and predicted post-cleanup production of 200,000 scf/d to 400,000 scf/d (5,663 cm/d to 11,327 cm/d), SIGMA³ said in a news release.

Commercial production is being targeted with the new horizontal.

“The horizontal well aims to optimize our frack design, enabling the full height of the shale to be stimulated with each frack,” Price said, later adding that the targeted depth will be about 11,647 ft (3,550 m). “It is possible to have commercial production in 2015 if the horizontal is successful. The quickest would probably be an LNG system, while a connection to existing pipelines would follow.”

For the upcoming horizontal well, 20 to 30 frack stages are being designed, and the proppant used will be ceramic. “In time, when consistently high proppant concentrations have been proven to emplaced in the fractures, it may be possible to revert to sand as a proppant—at a significant cost reduction,” Price said.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates Poland has about 4.4 Tcm (148 Tcf) of technically recoverable shale gas resources. The estimate was revised downward from the 2011 estimate of about 5.6 Tcm (187 Tcf).

Contact the author, Velda Addison, at vaddison@hartenergy.com.