APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200070030-5
Construction is now in progress, under a contract with Snam Progetti of Italy, on a major new petroleum refinery at Gdansk. The refinery, scheduled to be completed in 1975, will be supplied with 3 million tons of crude oil annually from Kuwait under a long-term contract with British Petroleum. Plans are also being made for the construction of a third major refinery, to be located at Blachownia Slaska in southern Poland; this plant is to have an annual crude charge capacity of 6 million tons when completed in 1977. Crude oil may be supplied to it from the Middle East via a pipeline through Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia.
The rapid expansion of refining capacity has made it possible for Poland to increase output of petroleum products from 876,000 tons in 1960 to 10.0 million tons in 1972. In the latter year, Poland produced about 80% of its supply of kerosene, fuel oils, and lubricating oils, as compared with only 80% in 1964.
Sizable natural gas deposits discovered in recent years in the Carpathian foothills, and the promise of still greater discoveries, have encouraged the leadership to emphasize natural gas in the country's fuel balance. Since 1960, gas production has risen rapidly, from 0.5 billion cubic meters to 5.8 billion cubic meters in 1972. A further increase in natural gas production to between 12 billion and 13 billion cubic meters by 1975 is planned.
In 1968, reported gas reserves were on the order of 40 billion cubic meters. Since then, estimates have been revised sharply upward to 100 billion cubic meters or more. Several major pipelines have become operative and others are under construction. The most important line now in operation links the Rzeszow area, Poland's largest gas basin, with the fertilizer plant at Pulawy and extends to Lublin and Warsaw.
d. Electric power
The electric power industry has grown steadily throughout the postwar period, with particularly rapid increases occurring in the 1960's and early 1970's. Since 1960 the national electric power capacity nearly tripled, and Poland now ranks first in the Communist East European area in electric power generating capacity and production. Production in 1972 amounted to 76.4 billion kilowatt-hours (kw.-hr.). At the end of that year, the installed generating capacity was 16.1 million kilowatts (kw.). In 1971, the electric power industry accounted for 12.6% of Poland's fixed assets and 2.6% of the country's gross industrial output.
Industry consumes two-thirds of the total electric power output. The chemical and metallurgical sectors are the principal industrial consumers of electricity, using 47% of the total industrial allocation. Other principal industrial consumers are the fuel, metalworking, wood and paper, textile, and food industries. The remaining electricity is allocated for households, commercial and governmental establishments, and the transport, agricultural, and public utility sectors of the economy. All urban areas have household electricity, and by 1971 all state farms and most private farms were electrified.
Thermal powerplants account for 95% of the total electric power capacity, and hydroelectric plants, the remainder. Thermal powerplants are fueled almost exclusively by domestic hard coal and brown coal. Almost one-half of the capacity is in the south-central part of the country, where the largest concentration of industry, the greatest urban density, and most of the hard coal mines are located. The largest powerplants, all thermal, are the 2-million-kw. Turoszow-Turow, the 1.2-million-kw. Laziska Gorne, and the 1.2-million-kw. Patnow. The combined capacity of these three powerplants comprises about 28% of the total national capacity.
Use of waterpower is limited because most of the rivers have small volumes of flow and the predominantly flat terrain would require a considerable expenditures of resources for dams to impound large reservoirs.
Transmission of electric power is accomplished by a national network encompassing 460,000 kilometers of transmission lines, including more than 5,700 kilometers of extra-high voltage (220 and 400 kv.) lines. High-voltage transmission lines cover a considerable portion of the country, connecting all important powerplants and providing service to the principal industrial and urban centers. The greatest density of transmission facilities is in the south-central part of the country, which includes the Upper Silesian Basin. The highest voltage transmission line (400 kv.) extends to this area from the large Turoszow-Turow powerplant in the southwest. The distribution system allows for exchanges of electricity with Czechoslovakia, East Germany, and the USSR. These changes have local significance in the border areas but have little effect on the national power supply.
Future development of the electric power base calls for an increase in generating capacity to about 20.5 million kw., with an annual production of 96 billion kw.-hr. by the end of 1975. The planned increase is to be accomplished primarily through construction and expansion of thermal powerplants. Two of the thermal plants under construction, the Kozienice and Gryfino Dolna Odra, are in the 1-million-kw. class. The largest
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200070030-5
