The Ministry of Environment has published the draft of the amendments to the Geological and Mining Law in Poland and is now accepting comments and opinions. The public consultation period will run up to March 18th, and Business&Law editors will participate by providing their insights. The Government decided to amend the existing law. It did not decide – as it was announced before – to specifically regulate the shale gas industry in a separate new piece of legislation. The Minister of Environment stated that in result of the amendments the concession granting system will be modernized, which will enable swift development of the Exploration&Production (E&P) sector, which in turn will give a boost to the economy and will provide benefits to the society. The goals of the new regulations are: the enhancement of safety of the E&P operations, increased participation of local communes in the profits from concession fees and introduction of user friendly environmental procedures. The draft introduces NOKE (Narodowy Operator Kopalin Energetycznych) – a state public company that will participate in the E&P operations on the basis of a cooperation agreement (details of which will be specified in subsidiary regulations) executed with the concession holders. The new law lays the foundations for the Generation Fund (Fundusz Pokoleń) which is meant to invest some of NOKE’s proceeds in education and Research &Development. Unfortunately, the regulations re. taxation of shale gas operations were left behind and will be the subject of a separate Act, prepared by the Ministry of Finance. We are closely monitoring this new shale gas legislation so please expect a more detailed analysis from us soon. The draft with supplementary documents (in Polish) can be found here.