But the 95.8% share price rise over the past month (30.6% in the last week) set off alarm bells for the ASX, since the company had not made any recent significant announcements about its operations.

Kimberley responded that it did not know of any information or reason for this, but referred to “widespread reports of significant increases in the prices of natural gas in Europe and more recently.”

More specifically, the company points to reports of “geo-political issues potentially affecting the supply of gas across Europe.”

The recent decision by Russia to temporarily halt supply to Ukraine directly resulted in the short-term restriction of gas supply to Western Europe.

For example, Gaz de France, the world’s fourth largest natural gas buyer, announced that deliveries from Russia were temporarily reduced by between 25 and 30%. Russian natural gas accounts for over 20% of France’s consumption, 30% of Germany’s and 25% in Italy.

“This recent incident and continuing debate over natural gas storage levels in the United Kingdom, highlight the uncertainty of supply of natural gas to the EU,” corporate director Anthony McClure said.

“Although the supply of natural gas to the EU is controlled by long-term contracts, the forward market has reacted significantly with heightened volatility.”

Kimberley started out as a Canning Basin oil company but following disappointing workover programs in its Western Australian permits last year it has evolved in a European-focused coalbed methane company.

The company claims it has the acreage, access to infrastructure and business plan to make a success of its European venture and accordingly, the directors decided to change Kimberley's name to reflect its new focus.

"The CBM/coal mine methane industry is rapidly expanding in historical coal producing regions of the world that are located close to industrial and domestic gas and electricity markets," company secretary Craig Ferrier said in a statement last month.

"The board believes that Europe will undergo considerable expansion as seen in North America."

According to Kimberley, about 650GW of new electricity capacity will be needed in Europe over the next 30 years. An additional 350GW is required to replace aging infrastructure. More than half of new capacity will be gas-fired, the company said.

This morning, the company said it was earning a 75% interest in three fully permitted projects in France. The Lorraine permit, granted in November 2004, is the most advanced licence and has historical coal production in excess of 850 million tonnes.

In mid-November, the company released a report outlining an estimated potential of several hundreds of billion cubic feet of P1 gas reserves in two major areas of the permit.

During the first half of this year, the company plans to start core drilling to provide further petrophysical parameters before pilot production, due to start in the second half.

European Gas said it was finalising programs including budgets, permitting and tendering for the initial drilling.

Occupying a combined area of 68 sqkm, the Saint Avold prospect has been estimated to contain 414.9 billion cubic feet of in-place gas, while Alsting has the potential for 576.3 billion cubic feet.

"Due to the high level of reliability of the data used for GIP (gas in place) calculations and examination of analogous coal basins - such as the northern Bowen Basin in Australia – the company expects that over 50% of the resource can be commercially discovered," the company said.

Kimberley is earning a 75% interest in the 460-sqkm Lorraine permit, granted in November last year. It said the permit, which occupies a large part of the Lorraine Basin, has historical coal production totalling over 850 million tonnes.

"The coal seams within the permit are of Carboniferous age and are characterised as black, gassy, high ranking coals," the company said.

In addition, the company has applied for a further 528 sqkm of acreage neighbouring the permit and covering the southern extensions of the Lorraine Basin.

Kimberley has also applied for several Italian CBM permits.

Under the name change, the company’s ASX code has changed from “KBO” to “EPG.”