Jan Krasoń, 1933-2015
Authority of the Greatest Powers
Dr. Jan Krasoń is one of the world's most prominent geologists, president and founder of Geoexplorers International, Inc. An outstanding scientist who triggered the shale revolution in Poland.
Jan Krasoń was the first to tell Americans that Poland is a gas Eldorado. They believed him because he was an expert trusted by the world's largest mining companies.
Invaluable
Poland's hero
This is the man discussed by many Polish and world newspapers due to his research and achievements concerning shale gas on a global scale. It is rightly claimed that he sparked the "shale gas revolution" in Poland and that he was the first to tell the Americans that Poland is the "gas El Dorado". Even though he never held this position, he was even given the unofficial title of the Chief Geologist of the Country (GGK). He was modest and composed, not exalting himself with knowledge and position. A patriot who became a national hero.
During his five-decade career, Jan Krasoń was instrumental in discovering and developing numerous deposits - including copper, gold, silver, natural gas, and various industrial minerals - on most continents of the world. He was considered one of the world's top experts in geology. As a consultant, he worked for many mining and oil companies, various NGOs, international and financial institutions, including the United Nations. In the last years of his life, he initiated shale gas exploration in Poland.
Biography
A difficult childhood
and studies
He was the oldest of seven siblings. His childhood was a time of war and occupation. He came to Żmigród as a child in 1945 and started elementary school. He settled in nearby Grądzik. His studies and passion for geology were important to him from the very beginning. He took up various jobs to earn money for school, e.g., in the town hall.
At 14 he moved to Wrocław for his high school education. His situation in the city, still destroyed at that time, was not easy. He spent nights at the Nadodrze railway station, he earned his living selling newspapers and working in a printing house, but Jan knew that this was not what he wanted to do. Finally, he got to study geology at the University of Wroclaw. He graduated with a master's degree and defended his dissertation on the sedimentation of Zechstein copper ore deposits in Lubin, which KGHM currently exploits.
He was a pupil of the eminent Professor Dr. Józef Zwierzycki, whose "work and patriotic activity he continued throughout his life".
In 1956-1966 he worked at the University of Warsaw as an assistant and then as an assistant professor. Afterward, he went on a year-long scholarship to Cairo, where together with the staff of the Cairo University, he participated in exploration projects in the desert.
1966 - 1969
Discovery in Africa and moving to the USA
From 1966 to 1969 he worked in Libya as a special geological advisor of the Libyan government. He came with his family - his wife and three children. He helped in discovering the largest deposits of sodium chloride and potassium salts in Africa. When war broke out in Libya and foreigners had to leave the country, he emigrated to the USA in 1969.
He settled in Denver, Colorado. Since then, for more than 20 years, the Polish authorities prohibited him from entering Poland.
"For a long time, we did not know where Jan was, where he had gone, we did not receive any news. Those were the times... And then suddenly letters without a return address started to arrive. They were always censored." - says Dr. Jan's sister.
1974 - 1995
American citizen
and Polish exile
In 1974 he founded his own company Geoexplorers International, Inc. and received American citizenship. In March 1981, when his father was dying, he tried very hard to come to Poland. He didn't know anything until the last minute. On the funeral day, people waited for him in the church for three hours, thinking that maybe he would still show up. Unfortunately, the priest present at the mass received a message that Jan Krasoń would not be there after all - he had not been allowed into Poland.
The only meeting between Jan and his parents (which he had planned very carefully) had taken place much earlier, in Rome.
Mrs. Irena (Jan's mother) suffered severely from the separation. Often, when she saw a plane flying by, she would cry out of longing and say, "Jan, Jan, I am here...". Dr. Krasoń came to Poland for the first time in the 1990s, when his mother became seriously ill (she died in 2001).
The Shale Revolution
Dr. Jan Krasoń became interested in the announced energy revolution associated with shale gas and gas hydrates (also known as methane hydrates). One of the major breakthroughs on this subject was the discovery of methane hydrates by geologists in the 1970s. This is methane trapped in ice cages on the seafloor.
The Japanese found the gas hydrate zone in the Nankai Trench, an earthquake zone. After analyzing a map of the epicontinental seas, Krasoń estimated that methane from gas hydrates could be enough to supply the world's energy needs for three thousand years. This was supposed to be a revolution that would dethrone the current owners of hydrocarbon deposits.
Dr. Jan Krasoń, together with Prof. Mariusz-Orion Jędrysek in 2006, got American oil companies interested in shale gas exploration in Poland. In his home country, Dr. Krasoń conducted research on the prospects for shale gas resources in the country's Paleozoic sediments. As a result, over 100 exploration concessions were granted and drilling projects were prepared. The legal arrangements introduced by the decision-makers made exploration difficult and discouraged investors.
Homeland as his
greatest love
In 2006 Dr. Krasoń completed a report on shale mining in Poland. But instead of showing it to the big companies, he handed it over to the Polish Ministry of Environment, saying: "I am a patriot and although I left my homeland a long time ago, I would still like to do something for it".
Until then, only Americans had experience in shale gas extraction. In Poland, the Polish Geological Institute and the Ministry didn't know anything about the subject. The value of Dr. Jan Krason's report was invaluable.
We had to wait for significant changes -it was not until 2008 when people started talking about shale gas in Poland. However, the real "shale gas revolution" did not begin until one year later.
Poland - the gas
Eldorado
Despite his worldwide achievements, Dr. Jan Krasoń always thought of his homeland in the first place. He devoted most of his research to Poland and focused on research and analysis of results concerning shale gas. Polish resources make up almost 1/3 of European deposits, about 5.3 billion m3.
These resources stretch from the Świetokrzyskie Mountains in the north-western direction to the bottom of the Baltic Sea towards Sweden. They are also found in Lower Silesia.
According to Dr. Krason - "this amount should satisfy Poland's demand for the next 300 years and significantly reduce the costs paid by us, the gas consumers."
Rejected by his compatriots
Dr. Jan Krason's activities for Poland reached even further. He also devoted his time to the topic of the recovery of precious metals, including platinum from copper mine waste. Dr. Jan took their samples, analyzed them and presented the results to the management of KGHM with a plan to recover the precious elements.
With his partner, Ryszard A. Korol, he developed the technology for recovering these elements, which offered the possibility of billions in profits. However, KGHM rejected Krasoń's proposal for unknown reasons.
Dr. Jan Krasoń, despite his enormous success, recognized in many places around the world, was repeatedly rejected in his own country.
A world authority
In his 50-year career, he was distinguished by his remarkable achievements. He contributed to discovering an extraordinary number of deposits on many continents. He was repeatedly awarded for his work. He received, among others, the title of "Outstanding Pole Abroad" awarded by the Polish Promotional Emblem Foundation "Poland Now".
Dr. Jan Krasoń's activities reached far beyond his home country. He has worked and lectured in over 60 countries. He is also the author or co-author of more than 140 scientific publications and about 300 reports.
Illness and his last days
Jan Krasoń fought a long and hard battle with lung cancer. Refusing chemotherapy, he followed a strict diet for seven years to help him fight the disease. Despite all the difficulties, he did not give up his professional work. He died on Jan. 21, 2015, in Denver.
"A year before his death, Krasoń came to his sister, in the countryside near Żmigród, to help himself by eating Polish, non-poisoned food. He then invited all of his college friends to dinner in Wroclaw." - recalls Michał P. Mierzejewski.
He got a second
life from fate
"He was always very religious. He took a rosary with him on all his expeditions. During an exhausting trip to Kamchatka, in the company of two scientist friends, in a rented jeep they drove across incredible hills, happened a thing, which his family still perceives as a sign. Jan was sitting in the car by the door. He had his rosary in his shirt pocket. The car was bouncing so hard that the rosary fell out of his pocket onto the floor. Jan bent down to pick it up. He must have accidentally hooked the handle because the door opened and he fell out of the car. When he got up, the vehicle with the other expedition members had disappeared.
It turned out that the car with the people had fallen into a chasm, and everyone had died. Heartbroken and exhausted, he reached the nearest village on foot. Shortly afterward, when he went on vacation to Poland, everyone immediately knew something was wrong. He was depressed and apathetic, although he always claimed that staying at his family home was like the best sanatorium.
The Kamchatka event proved to be a great shock. The siblings spent many nights talking. He had to get it out of his system so that he could start a new chapter of his life, given to him by fate, and make the most of it.
Russia is responsible for the Smolensk air disaster
Jan Krasoń was very much affected by the Smolensk catastrophe. He was totally convinced that “Russia is responsible for this planned accident”. Furthermore, he knew Russia like few others. He repeated that “the murder in Katyn of the Polish elite and the murder in Smolensk served the same purpose - the destabilization and weakening of the Polish State.
He looked with disbelief at the Polish “Secret Service” passivity and some Polish “politicians” attitude to this tragedy. He often said that “they are either very naive or very stupid”. However, he emphasized that thanks to them, “Russia has achieved what it intended in Poland anyway”.
Did you know…
See all achievements
Dr. Jan Krasoń and Prof. Józef Zwierzycki were strong opponents of communism, and they did not hide this fact, which resulted in many repressions.
Three scientists who contributed to the discovery of copper and silver deposits in Lower Silesia were: Professor Józef Zwierzycki, Dr. Jan Wyżykowski and Dr. Jan Krasoń.
He worked with and was friends with billionaire Dr. Gene E. Phillips, a close friend and neighbor of President George H.W. Bush in Texas. While providing geological services to Gene, he was always treated with great respect. Gene would often send his personal Boeing to Denver, Colorado, to pick up Jan Krason and take him to any place in the world.
Jan Krasoń, like his mentor Professor Józef Zwierzycki, believed that "it is an honor to be Polish". He always had Poland in his heart, and always said that "one has only one homeland".
From the1980s, he was treated honorably in the former Soviet Union by the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and later by the Russian Academy of Sciences. Still, in Poland, he was considered persona non grata. The communist Soviet Union benefited from his knowledge, but his own country, Poland, ignored him.
He was hailed as "The Greatest Man in Japan" after speaking at a symposium in Kyoto. The speech revolved around oil and gas hydrates and Japan's complete lack of dependence on imports by exploring deposits on the outskirts of the country.
Jan Krasoń considered KGHM's purchase of Sierra Gorda in Chile a "hole in the desert". He foresaw all the problems associated with this investment.
He was hosted by Ghanaian President Jerry John Rawlings and leading politicians.
He was a major critic of KGHM's 2012 purchase of Canadian company Quadra FNX Mining Ltd. as "money thrown down the drain" and the critic of a deliberate weakening of the mining sector in Poland. He was surprised that KGHM hurriedly overpaid by almost double for Quadra, which no one wanted to buy anyway.
During Jan Krason's partnership with Gene E. Phillips, Chinese investors offered Jan $350,000 per day to advise on new precious metal deposits in Africa and mining waste management in China.
According to geologist Lindsey V. Maness, Jr., in the 1980s, Jan Krasoń, in opposition to many scientists, announced in a report to the United Nations that there was enough natural gas for 1000s of years. And it all came true.
He believed that politicians shouldn’t dictate to scientists what to do.
Geoexplorers
International, Inc.
Geoexplorers International, Inc. was founded in 1974 by John Krason and has been operating worldwide ever since. It is a highly reputable consulting corporation with an international reputation.
Its wide range of activities has gained worldwide experience, especially in practical research and exploration for commercially profitable mineral and petroleum deposits, including mine waste evaluation.
Geoexplorers International, Inc. and Dr. Jan Krasoń have become exceptionally familiar with many, often huge mining heaps through worldwide consulting activities, previous and ongoing involvement in exploration - especially for the base and precious metals, including platinum group elements (PGEs).
Geoexplorers International, Inc. is an exploration and consulting company founded in 1974 by Dr. Jan Krason specializing in discovering and recovering precious metals from sedimentary rocks, particularly those found in black shales and flotation tailings.
In black shale, precious metals accumulate in the form of nanoparticles that are less than a micron in size, which are not recovered by traditional technologies. The extraction of precious metals from shale rock is a complicated worldwide challenge. We have the only innovative and effective technology "6M-EX" for the concentration of these metal nanoparticles and their recovery.