Venezuela's
Petrozuata extra heavy crude project to double its drilling capacity
this year
Orinoco
Faja ( belt) basing
By Elio Ohep
CARACAS
Petroleumworld.com 02 22 06
Venezuela's oil company PDVSA and ConocoPhillips partners in Petrozuata
synthetic oil producer of the extra heavy oil crude of the Orinoco
Faja basin plan to drill twice as many new wells this year, the
president of the joint venture said Tuesday.
"We
plan to drill 28 wells, that is double the activity of last year,"
Petrozuata President Ruben Figuera said in a telephone interview,
Dow Jones reported.
He
said the project is currently processing 120,000 barrels a day
of extra-heavy crude on average, but has enough capacity to increase
its processing to 145,000 b/d after an upgrade at its refinery
last year.
In
the fourth quarter of 2005 Petrozuata's refinery tested a new
upgrade of the refinery and operated at 145,000 b/d for 30 days."It
worked perfectly," said Figuera.
Petrozuata
process extra heavy oil of 7-8 API into synthetic oil at 27 API
to send to special refineries or mixed with lighter grades of
crude oil before traditional refineries can convert it into products
such as gasoline.
Conoco has a 50.1% stake in the Petrozuata partnership, while
PDVSA holds the remaining 49.9%.
Venezuela
currently produce 630,000 b/d in the four extra heavy oil projects
of the Orinoco Faja and converts it into 570,000 b/d of synthetic
oil, according to figures from the U.S. DoE.
PDVSA
has reserves of 200 billion barrels of extra heavy oil in the
Orinoco Faja Basin Venezuela is currently teamed up with foreign
state oil companies from Iran, Spain, Russia, China, India and
Brazil to certified its oil reserves in areas of the Orinoco Faja
Basin.
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By Elio Ohep, editor@petroleumworld.com, 58 412 996 3730, Caracas.
Petroleumworld News 02 21 06
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