A huge offshore oil discovery could raise Brazil's petroleum reserves by 40 per cent and boost the country into the ranks of the world's major exporters, officials said.
The government-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras, said the new "ultra-deep" Tupi field could hold as much as eight billion barrels of recoverable light crude, sending Petrobras shares soaring and prompting predictions that Brazil could join the world's top ten oil producers.
Petrobras President Sergio Gabrielli said yesterday the oil from ultra-deep areas, including the Tupi field, would give Brazil the world's eighth-largest oil and gas reserves.
"Brazil's reserves will lie somewhere between those of Nigeria and those of Venezuela," Mr Gabrielli said at a news conference. Petrobras says the Tupi field, off Brazil's southeastern Atlantic coast, has between five billion and eight billion barrels - equivalent to 40 per cent of all the oil ever discovered in Brazil.
Brazil's total oil reserves currently rank 17th in the world, with 14.4 billion barrels of oil equivalent, Gabrielli said. Yesterday's news of the discovery rocked a country that became a net oil exporter only last year, but must still import light crude oil for the refined products it needs. Brazil produces - and exports - mostly heavy crude oil, which has to be mixed with the light oil in refineries.
"If this is confirmed, we will no longer be a 'medium' country, pursuing self-sufficiency and exporting a little. It will transform the nation to another level, with exporting properties like Venezuela, Arab nations and others," said Dilma Rousseff, presidential chief of staff. For a country that went deeply into debt buying foreign oil in the 1970s and '80s, "this has changed our reality", she said.
Ms Rousseff also announced that Brazil was withdrawing 41 blocks of underwater territory from an auction of 312 prospective oil blocks to be held this month. The country will still put the remaining 261 blocks up for auction but will reserve the most promising areas around the Tupi field for itself.
The Tupi field lies under 2,140 metres (7,060 feet) of water, more than 3,000 metres (almost 10,000 feet) of sand and rocks, and then another 2,000-metre (6,600-foot) thick layer of salt. The company drilled test wells that lie under 2,166 metres (7,100 feet) of water, 286 kilometres (177 miles) south of Rio de Janeiro.