Mittelplate is Germany's largest oil field, 7 km (4.3 mi) from the shore, in the environmentally important Schleswig-Holstein Wadden Sea National Parks tidal flats.

[3] The field was discovered in 1981 through the Mittelplate 1 well, which confirmed that the reservoir contained 75 million tonnes (83,000,000 tons) of crude oil.

Due to the location of the field in an ecologically sensitive area, hydrographic, hydrodynamic and meteorological studies modelling storm, wave and ice-flow conditions were done, with the result that an artificial island holding a drilling and production facility was built in 1985.

[4] The oil in the Mittelplate field is trapped in Dogger (Middle Jurassic) sandstones of uppermost Aalenian to lowermost Callovian in age.

A new redevelopment plan included the construction of a land-based facility in Dieksand from which 2,000–3,000 m-long (6,600–9,800 ft) extended-reach production wells[4] were to tap into the eastern part of the field.

[5] Oil is pumped ashore and water extracted during processing is then routed back by the second pipeline for reinjection into the lower section of the reservoir.

[1] Since 2000, nearly horizontal wells (some up to about 9,200 metres [30,200 ft] long) have been extracting from the eastern part of the field directly from land on Dieksand / Friedrichskoog.