Cuba oil claims raise eyebrows in energy world

HAVANA (Reuters) – Cuba’s announcement last week that its still untapped offshore oil fields may hold more than 20 billion barrels of oil has raised eyebrows among outside oil experts who say the big number is hard to believe but not out of the realm of possibility.

They said Cuba has excellent geologists, but they would like to see the findings verified by independent experts who have no stake in the Caribbean island’s oil future.

Potential reserves of 20 billion barrels or more would put Cuba in the big leagues of world oil producers and bring new prosperity to the communist-run island that imports more than half its energy needs.

The island, working with foreign partners, produces 60,000 barrels of oil a day, all of it from wells based onshore and most of them along Cuba’s northern coast, said Rafael Tenreyro Perez, production manager at the state oil monopoly Cubapetroleo, or Cupet.

The oil world has generally assumed that Cuba’s offshore fields, mostly in the Gulf of Mexico, may contain around 5 billion barrels of oil and 10 trillion cubic feet (283 billion cubic metres) of natural gas, based on a study by the U.S. Geological Survey.

Reuters