[Graeme]

VENEZUELA #1 -- Claims 297 Billion Barrels of Proven Oil Reserves

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '�')��At the end of 2010, we had a level of 217 billion barrels of oil, and now, at the start of this year, we are in a position to certify 297 billion barrels,” says Venezuela Energy and Petroleum Minister Rafael Ramirez, meaning that the South American nation would now have more oil than the 265 billion of world leader Saudi Arabia.


CARACAS – Venezuela holds 297 billion barrels of proven oil reserves, Energy and Petroleum Minister Rafael Ramirez said.

“At the end of 2010, we had a level of 217 billion barrels of oil, and now, at the start of this year, we are in a position to certify 297 billion barrels,” he told reporters Wednesday from his office in Caracas.

The minister recalled that in 1998, when President Hugo Chavez was elected for his first term, the country had 75 billion barrels of oil reserves, “35 billion of them wrongly classified as bitumen from the Orinoco Belt” in eastern Venezuela.

Of the current total of 297 billion barrels, 220 billion are located in the Orinoco Belt, “which gives us a solid footing for our entire expansion plan in the oil production area,” Ramirez said.

[Maddog78]

Jobs for the boys coming soon in Angola.



http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-2 ... cmpid=yhoo


$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'B')P Plc and Exxon Mobil Corp. were among companies awarded rights to explore offshore pre-salt blocks in Angola that may contain deposits to rival the biggest discoveries in decades.

Sonangol SA, the African nation’s state-run oil company, awarded 11 concessions to 13 explorers, also including Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips, the company said today at a press conference. It was the first Angolan bidding round since 2007.

Angola and the explorers will be looking in geological formations similar to the pre-salt structures in Brazil that scientists say may hold at least 124 billion barrels of oil. Petroleo Brasileiro SA’s Lula field, discovered in 2006 and formerly known as Tupi, was the biggest find in the Americas since Mexico’s Cantarell in 1976.

“Exploration of pre-salt oil requires a greater technology complexity, it involves financial and human resources of a dimension that we have never done in Angola,” said Carlos Saturnino, Sonangol’s director of negotiations. “The comparison term should be the Tupi pre-salt in Brazil. In Angola, we’re heading in more or less same dimension.”

The explorers will negotiate with Sonangol until March to work out details for the blocks, the company said.

Other producers awarded licenses include Norway’s Statoil ASA, Total SA and Eni Spa.

[Graeme]

Brazilian Amazon May Hold `Super Giant' Fields of Light Oil

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'B')razil’s Amazon may hold “super giant” fields of light oil in an area the country is starting to explore, HRT Participacoes em Petroleo SA Chief Executive Officer Marcio Mello said. The shares gained.

The Rio de Janeiro-based oil-exploration company will start producing from its wells in the Amazon’s Solimoes river basin as early as June, Mello said today in a Bloomberg Television interview in New York. HRT will begin drilling in February and expects to reach an oil reservoir in May, he said.

HRT raised about $1.5 billion in an initial share sale in October to help fund exploration in the Amazon and off the coast of Namibia. It has majority stakes in 21 exploration blocks in the Solimoes Basin and five offshore blocks in the African nation. HRT will drill 12 wells at the Amazon this year.

[Sixstrings]

Oh nice, another reason to tear up the Amazon.

[AirlinePilot]

Continued Drilling Delays to Negatively Impact Deepwater GOM
Policy advisers for the American Petroleum Institute (API) warned that continued delays for deepwater drilling permits in the Gulf of Mexico would negatively impact deepwater Gulf development as well as Gulf region jobs and the nation's energy security.

http://www.rigzone.com/news/article.asp ... 447&hmpn=1

[Xenophobe]

This is just...terrible.

However, if Katrina couldn't kill off Gulf oil production as some were hoping, I seriously doubt the bureaucrats can do any better.

[AirlinePilot]

I do not recall anyone here talking about Katrina "killing" GOM production. I think that hurricanes are a large inconvenience but ive not ever entertained the idea (nor have I seen anyone else) that it would do anything but temporarily hit production.

I think the present situation does nothing but cloud the future with respect to what we can do in the GOM . I also believe that future projects will have higher risks and we will see more "problems" associated with deep water production as we look to lower EROEI sources to maintain the plateau.

[Plantagenet]

Its a classic "Catch-22" situation.

The Obama administration currently doesn't forbid offshore drilling.

They just don't issue any permits for offshore drilling.

[Xenophobe]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AirlinePilot', 'I') do not recall anyone here talking about Katrina "killing" GOM production.

[bratticus]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Double bombing in Iraq kills 27, injures dozens
Most of those slain in the northern oil-rich city of Kirkuk are police officers. A roadside bomb injures eight policemen rushing to the blast scene.
By Asso Ahmed and Ned Parker / Los Angeles Times / May 19, 2011

A double bombing killed at least 27 people, almost all of them police officers, and wounded dozens in a parking lot outside the main police offices in the oil-rich city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq on Thursday, according to security officials.

... Kirkuk is rife with ethnic and sectarian tensions among Arabs, Kurds and Turkmens, all of whom view themselves as the rightful owners of the province with immense oil reserves. The Kurds wish to annex the area to their semiautonomous Kurdistan region, while Arabs insist it should be under Baghdad's control. Despite eight years of U.S.-backed efforts to mediate a solution, the sides remain at loggerheads. ...

[bratticus]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Two North Iraq’s Oil Company injured in Kirkuk IED blast
Aswat Al Iraq / May 19, 2011

“An IED blew off under a vehicle of two employees of the North Oil Company in Kirkuk in Riyadh Township, 45 km to the southwest of Kirkuk, seriously wounding both men and causing serious damage to their vehicle,” Brigadier Sarhad Qader told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

[bratticus]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Police chief escapes car bomb attack in Iraq's Kirkuk, 4 bodyguards killed
People's Daily Online / May 20, 2011

Colonel Aras Mohammed, head of counter-terrorism department of Kirkuk province, survived unharmed the blast that targeted his convoy in central Kirkuk, the capital city of Kirkuk province, the source said on condition of anonymity.

[Hughj]

I'm going to have a drink! It's 5 oclock somewhere!

Hugh

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Hughj', 'I')'m going to have a drink! It's 5 oclock somewhere!

Hugh

[GoIllini]

I think it could be more than just that. Short-term fundamentals of potentially taking Greece off the oil market, a slowdown in China, and weak jobs numbers in the US have pushed WTI down from $110 to $90. You don't get that big of a swing from SPR withdrawals; the former CEO of Shell said that Obama's impact on oil prices was very minute.

That said, oil is probably going back up to $120 the second oil traders get a whiff of declines in inventories.

Long-run, (responsible) fracking, electric-powered cars, wind turbines and a fairly slack electricity market already will be helpful in dealing with rising oil prices.

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('GoIllini', '[')b]You don't get that big of a swing from SPR withdrawals; the former CEO of Shell said that Obama's impact on oil prices was very minute.

[Pops]

Here's how it goes Hugh, we welcome all views here so disagree to your hearts content.

But there are ongoing threads about every aspect of oil pricing, don't start a new one on every move.

If your sole purpose here is to "stick your finger in the eye" of this website, you aren't welcome.

Make up your mind.

[GoIllini]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'Y')eah but it's not just American strategic reserves.. I didn't see a list of countries, but sounds like Europe is tapping theirs too?