WorldOil

Pre-salt to propel Brazil toward the top

Magda Chambriad, general director of the Brazil Petroleum Agency (ANP), points to the pre-salt clusters of the deepwater Santos, Campos and Espírito Santo basins to explain the terrifically bullish prospects for the nation’s E&P sector. “Brazil today represents 25% of global oil production, and with the new pre-salt province, that number shall increase significantly,” she said in early May during a luncheon address at the 2012 Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) in Houston. Indeed, with the U.S. State Department and other forecasters putting the estimated recoverable reserves in the pre-salt conservatively at between 30 billion and 80 billion bbl, little wonder why giant Petrobras believes it is on the doorstep to becoming one of the world’s top five oil producers. In its 2020 Strategic Plan, the once wholly state-owned operator said over the next eight years it expects to have doubled its overall proved reserves, with much of the expected increase to come from the pre-salt structures. The pre-salt, many say, could provide the final push to Brazil taking its long-sought role as one of the world’s premier oil superpowers.