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Mexico's proven oil, natural gas reserves fall 2.8 pct
(EFE Ingles Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Mexico City, Mar 20 (EFE).- Mexico's proven reserves of oil and natural gas fell 2.8 percent last year to 14.31 billion barrels of oil equivalent, state-owned Petroleos Mexicanos said Friday in a conference call.
Proven reserves - defined as the volume of hydrocarbons known with reasonable certainty to be commercially recoverable with existing technology - as of Jan. 1 had fallen by 409.5 million boe relative to the previous year, Pemex said.
With that level of reserves, Mexico has enough crude and equivalent to meet domestic demand for 9.9 years,
The 2008 reserve replacement ratio, which is the ratio of new reserves found to oil produced, rose sharply to 71.8 percent, a record high, Pemex said, adding that total proven and probable reserves (2P) and total proven, possible and probable reserves (3P) are sufficient to meet demand for 19.9 years and 30 years, respectively.
Annual production totaled 1.45 billion barrels in 2008, a year in which Pemex said it added 1.04 billion barrels of new proven crude reserves.
Pemex has struggled in recent years to cope with declining production at aging projects such as the offshore Cantarell Field, once Mexico's crown jewel.
Output at Mexico's current largest field, Ku Maloob Zaap in the Bay of Campeche, also is expected to peak over the next four years and then start declining.
The company's objectives are "to increase the recovery rate at mature fields, accelerate the development of new reserves and promote the use of new technologies," Pemex's exploration and production director, Carlos Morales Gil, said in the conference call.
The Mexican Congress approved energy reform legislation last year that allows limited partnerships with foreign firms to develop areas such as the promising though technically challenging Chicontepec onshore development, although private ownership of oil production is still prohibited.
Separately, Mexican President Felipe Calderon said this week that the site of a new oil refinery, the country's seventh, will be announced on April 15 after a public debate on proposals submitted by the nine states in competition.
During the celebration of the 71st anniversary of the nationalization of Mexico's oil industry, the president said Wednesday that the government has received proposals from the states of Campeche, Tabasco, Oaxaca, Veracruz, Puebla, Tamaulipas, Tlaxcala, Hidalgo and Michoacan.
Once on stream, the new facility will help alleviate a shortfall in refining capacity that forces Mexico to send crude abroad for processing.
Oil exports are Mexico's leading source of hard currency, followed by remittances from Mexicans living in the United States and tourism. EFE
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Copyright ? 2009 EFE News Services (U.S.) Inc.
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