Natural gas: opposition to gas drilling in Upper Bavaria
There is resistance to upcoming exploratory drilling in the municipality of Reichling. The suspected natural gas deposit is not large.
Protest action at the planned drilling site.
(Image: Tino Boecher / Greenpeace)
The energy company Genexco wants to drill for natural gas in the Landsberg district from next September. This is meeting with resistance in the municipality of Reichling in the Munich region, which is specifically affected. On Thursday, the local citizens' initiative, supported by Greenpeace, went to the planned drilling site. The planned well with a 40-metre high tower is 150 meters away from a European protected area for animals and plants and 200 meters from the community's drinking water sources, are two of the arguments against it.
Bavarian Minister of Economic Affairs Hubert Aiwanger (FW) approved the search for natural gas deposits in the "Lech" field in the Landsberg district at the end of September 2022. Natural gas is suspected there that has not yet been tapped. "Considering the exploding gas prices, we as the Bavarian state government want to use all options to defuse the crisis. That is why we are also supporting the search for domestic natural gas," said Aiwander at the time.
Natural gas production is worthwhile again
At the end of June this year, the South Bavarian Mining Authority approved exploratory drilling in Reichling. The US company Mobil had already drilled for oil there in 1983, but found natural gas. As the price of gas was quite low at the time, the yield was not worthwhile, explains the Bayerische Staatszeitung. The situation has changed and now Genexco wants to invest 5 million euros in new drilling.
Greenpeace puts the estimated amount of natural gas in Reichling at 300 million to 500 million m³. According to Martin Stümpfig, a Green Party member of the Bavarian state parliament, this is enough to cover Bavaria's natural gas consumption for two weeks. Instead of investing in fossil fuels, Aiwanger would be better off promoting wind energy and geothermal energy, says Greenpeace. In addition to the Lech gas field, the minister should also refrain from drilling for gas at the Ammersee or in Holzkirchen.
The municipality of Reichling has no means of preventing gas drilling, Johannes Hintersberger explains in a letter to the municipality (PDF). It is neither the approval authority nor the operator of the project and can only submit requests in the form of comments to the South Bavarian Mining Authority in the participation process. Hintersberger also writes that the upcoming test drillings by Genexco will save the municipality from having to drill its own boreholes to find the geothermal energy. This would save 1.5 million euros.
Geothermal energy after the gas
Eckhard Oehms, Managing Director of Genexco Gas GmbH, also points this out. Once the gas has been used, the boreholes can be reused for heating projects. He told the Bayerische Staatszeitung newspaper that temperatures of up to 120 °C prevail at a depth of 3,000 meters, which the municipalities could make good use of for local heating networks. Although the estimated production volume of natural gas is low, there are local industries that would purchase the natural gas. This is more environmentally friendly than using coal to generate electricity.
In this context, Peter Satzger from the Bund Naturschutz (BN) in the Landsberg district points out that it is not only the result of the test drilling in Reichling that is decisive, but also whether a planned 8 km long gas pipeline to Denklingen can be built. The Merkur quotes Satzger as saying that the land required for this would first have to be made available. Some critics fear that gas extraction could lead to earthquakes, as in Groningen in the Netherlands.
(anw)