The Chicontepec Basin (Chicontepec Formation) is a petroleum system in
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
north-east of
Mexico City
Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital city, capital and primate city, largest city of Mexico, and the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North Amer ...
, covering an area of around in the states of
Veracruz
Veracruz (), formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave), is one of the 31 states which, along with Me ...
,
Puebla and
Hidalgo
Hidalgo may refer to:
People
* Hidalgo (nobility), members of the Spanish nobility
* Hidalgo (surname)
Places
Mexico
* Hidalgo (state), in central Mexico
* Hidalgo, Coahuila, a town in the north Mexican state of Coahuila
* Hidalgo, Nuevo Leà ...
. Several oil fields have been discovered in that area since 1926. A major field was discovered in 1973 but contains
extra heavy crude, which due to special refining needs is considered unviable at this time. Since that time, tiny amounts of oil have been produced. While the reserves are overwhelmingly extra heavy crude, pockets of lighter
tight oil
Tight oil (also known as shale oil, shale-hosted oil or light tight oil, abbreviated LTO) is light crude oil contained in unconventional petroleum-bearing formations of low permeability, often shale or tight sandstone.
Economic production from ...
, as well as
natural gas
Natural gas (also called fossil gas or simply gas) is a naturally occurring mixture of gaseous hydrocarbons consisting primarily of methane in addition to various smaller amounts of other higher alkanes. Low levels of trace gases like carbo ...
, are also found in the basin.
Attempts at increasing output
In March 2006, Mexican President
Vicente Fox
Vicente Fox Quesada (; born 2 July 1942) is a Mexican businessman and politician who served as the 62nd president of Mexico from 1 December 2000 to 30 November 2006. After campaigning as a right-wing populist, Fox was elected president on the ...
announced that Pemex would invest US$37.5 billion over the next 20 years on the oil fields of Chicontepec. It was hoped that this will boost output to . Pemex's chief executive estimates that 20,000 wells are to be drilled in order to exploit this field.
Intensive drilling has taken place in Chicontepec in recent years, starting with a contract for 500 new wells offered in December 2008. However, results in terms of output have been disappointing, with the field still yielding a modest in May 2012.
See also
*
Petroleum industry in Mexico
The petroleum industry in Mexico makes Mexico the eleventh largest producer of oil in the world and the thirteenth largest in terms of net exports. Mexico has the seventeenth largest oil reserves in the world, and it is the fourth largest oil p ...
References
{{Use dmy dates, date=August 2011
Geologic formations of Mexico
Oil fields in Mexico
Geography of Hidalgo (state)
Geography of Puebla
Geography of Veracruz
Pemex