Petrobras may emerge among top oil producers with new oil find in Santos Basin

12 September 2008

Brazil's state-controlled oil company, Petroleo Brasileiro SA, (Petrobras) said it has found an estimated three to four billion barrels of recoverable light crude oil in an offshore field in the Santos Basin close to the earlier Tupi find.

The discovery was made from the Iara well in the BM-S-11 block off the coast of Rio de Janeiro in which Petrobras owns 65 per cent of the field along with the UK's BG Group of Britain owns 25 per cent, and Galp Energia of Lisbon owns 10 per cent. Petrobas is the gas field operator.

Last year Brazil attracted global attention when it announced the discovery of the second-biggest oil find in 20 years in the Tupi basin that measures 800km by 200 km - off Brazil's southern coast that analysts say may contain a massive 5 billion to 8 billion barrels of untapped light oil. (See: Iran invites Brazil to join OPEC) 

Subsequently, other finds in the Santos Basin suggest Tupi's find may be just the tip of a huge reservoir of light crude.

Petrobras said that the Iara oil field find, can boost Brazil's oil production and turn the country into one of the largest oil producers in the world. It also put the estimated value for Petrobras stake in the Iara field between $10 billion and $15 billion.

Brazil's 12.6-billion barrels of proven oil reserves could nearly be doubled with the Tupi and Iara find thereby slowly moving towards recovering the unofficial estimated oil reserves contained in the subsalt band between 50 billion and 80 billion barrels.