Economics of Coalbed Methane in North West Spain

Abstract

Coal during its carbonization process produces a gas. This gas, mainly formed by methane, can be used. The use of CBM (Coal bed methane) as an energetic resource is not much known in Spain. This work is the first step to enhance the development of this resource in Castilla y León. A theoretical review and a state of the art description have been carried out, taking into account all the factors that can influence in the development of a CBM project. Then CBM resources have been quantified by Castilla y León accurately for every coal bed. After that, technical feasibility has been used to evaluate total amount of gas that can be recovered. The last step was to evaluate economic feasibility to know how much gas could be economically profitable. This paper covers the economic factor and exploitation options of CBM in Castilla y León, considering technical parameters together with costs and economic requirements for the tow most promising areas in north-west Spain. The main findings include that a CBM system would be feasible in Guardo-Barruelo, however, the economic feasibility will be limited to long operation time of the wells and an increase of the prices of natural gas. In North Leon, the results show a high profitability even under low natural gas prices.