Brazil hits record crude production

Brazil's output of crude reached record levels in 2011 as new production came onstream from the so-called subsalt oil fields in the Santos Basin, its National Petroleum Agency said on Thursday according to a report.

The Santos Basin only a few years ago hardly produced oil but is expected to become one of the country's most prolific basins, rivaling the Campos Basin, which accounts for 83% of Brazil's current oil output, Reuters reported.

Since Brazil revealed its vast subsalt discoveries in 2007, the country is expected to become the largest oil producer in the Americas, eclipsing the United States, Venezuela and Canada over the next decade.

Petrobras, the state-controlled oil company that accounts for 90% of Brazil's oil and gas output, has been criticized for its slow increase in output since the discoveries were announced. But oil output rose to a record 768 million barrels in 2011, up 2.5% from the year before, the ANP said.

Natural gas output rose nearly 5 percent from the year before to 24 billion cubic meters.

In December, output of crude was also a record, averaging 2.214 million barrels a day, up 1.6% from a year earlier. Natural gas production during the month averaged 71 million cubic meters a day on average, up 3.1% from the year earlier.

Subsalt production of oil rose to an unprecedented 167,500 bpd and of natural gas to 5.5 million cubic meters a day, for a combined output of 200,600 barrels of oil equivalent a day, up 6.3 percent from November, the ANP said.

The biggest increases in output came from the Lula, a subsalt field with recoverable reserves of 8 billion barrels. Output from the subsalt reserves is expected to continue to grow and bring Brazilian per-day output to 6 million barrels by the end of this decade, nearly triple current production, Petrobras said recently.

Upstream Online - News wires 02 February 2012