14-11-06

State-run oil holding Petroleos de Venezuela (PdVSA) is to introduce as extra-heavy oil the prodigious reserves in the Orinoco oil belt during the World Congress of Heavy Crude Oils held in Beijing. In the meantime, Venezuela received from Canadian Ryder Scott a document attesting to the existence of 45.5 bn barrels of original, onsite oil in block Carabobo I.
This area, jointly operated by PdVSA and Brazilian Petrobras, forms an integral part of the 27 blocks delimited by the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum last year during the opening of the Magna Reserve project. This blueprint is intended to count and certify at least 260 bn barrels of oil. In addition to the existing amount of 80 bn barrels of oil, the country's reserves would total 340 bn barrels as from 2008, the largest in the world.

After reading the attestation of the reserves in Carabobo I, the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum issued a statement according to which total proved reserves account for 87.6 bn barrels of oil. Out of the 45.5 bn declared onsite, 20 %, or 7.6 bn barrels, is expected to be recovered.
Following the opening of the second bridge over River Orinoco, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and his Brazilian counterpart Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, featured the event held in well MA-192. This well is part of block Carabobo II, in the process of prospecting drilling.

The reserves to be drilled from block Carabobo I are intended to feed one of the enhancement gears that will process the oil in the belt. Upon treatment, at least 100,000 bpd of this oil will go to Pernambuco refinery. The founding stone of the joint facilities with a capacity of 200,000 bpd to be built in northern Brazil was laid this current year. Based on PdVSA numbers, the project was recalculated at 9 bn barrels.
Petrobras is not the only one with an interest in the belt quantification. Under memoranda of understanding executed with the Venezuelan Government, other ten companies bound themselves to Magna Reserve. They include: Spanish Repsol, Indian ONGC, Iranian Petropars, Russian LUKoil and Gazprom, Chinese CNPC, Uruguayan Ancap, Argentinean Enarsa, Belorussian Belarusneft and PetroVietnam.

The way of apportioning the areas for the purposes of drilling among the companies with a stake in the belt is still unknown.
"These reserves have been certified when the world suffers of falling reserves," said Petrobras CEO José Sergio Gabrielli. He added that the bilateral projects discussed by Petrobras and PdVSA are well advanced and mentioned particularly the gas offshore project called Mariscal Sucre and discussions on mature fields.