Libra oil field is a large ultra-deepwater oil prospect located in the

Santos Basin The Santos Basin ( pt, Bacia de Santos) is an approximately large mostly offshore sedimentary basin. It is located in the south Atlantic Ocean, some southeast of Santos, Brazil. The basin is one of the Brazilian basins to have resulted from th ...

, about off the coast of

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

, north of Tupi field. Libra is in the process of being tested and may turn out to be the largest pre-salt find in the basin, ahead of the

Tupi oil field The Tupi oil field (reverted from Lula oil field) is a large oil field located in the Santos Basin, off the coast of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The field was originally nicknamed in honor of the Tupi people and later named after the mollusc, how ...

, making the largest find since

Cantarell Field Cantarell Field or Cantarell Complex is an supergiant offshore oil field in Mexico. It was discovered in 1976 after oil stains were noticed by a fisherman, Rudesindo Cantarell Jimenez, in 1972. It was placed on nitrogen injection in 2000, and pr ...

in 1976. National Agency of Petroleum (ANP) officials are confident Libra will contain even more recoverable oil than Franco oil field.

History

The field was discovered in May 2010 at the same time as the Franco prospect. Libra is located from Franco and is being drilled by

Petrobras Petróleo Brasileiro S.A., better known by the portmanteau Petrobras (), is a state owned enterprise, state-owned Brazilian multinational corporation in the petroleum industry headquartered in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The company's name transla ...

contracted by the ANP. Officials confirmed that Franco and Libra are not linked to the nearby Iara field. On 14 July 2010, the first exploration well collapsed when it reached an underwater salt bed. A second layer of hydrocarbons was found in late December 2010. Eleven companies including CNOOC, CNPC, Ecopetrol, Mitsui, ONGC Videsh (OVL), Petrogal, Petrobras, Petronas, Repsol-Sinopec, Shell and Total were approved by ANP to participate in the Libra auction. Of these, only nine paid financial guarantees to ANP. Production rights were awarded 21 October 2013 to a consortium led by Petrobras, including France's

TotalEnergies TotalEnergies SE is a French Multinational corporation, multinational integrated energy and List of oil exploration and production companies, petroleum company founded in 1924 and one of the seven Big Oil, supermajor oil companies. Its businesses ...

and Anglo-Dutch Royal Dutch Shell Plc, who each took 20 percent of the partnership, while

China National Petroleum Corp The China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) () is a major national oil and gas corporation of China and one of the largest integrated energy groups in the world. Its headquarters are in Dongcheng District, Beijing. CNPC was ranked fourth ...

and China's

CNOOC China National Offshore Oil Corporation, or CNOOC Group (Chinese: 中国海洋石油总公司 Pinyin: ''Zhōngguó Háiyáng Shíyóu Zǒnggōngsī''), is one of the largest national oil companies in China, and the third-largest national oil c ...

took 10 percent each. Petrobras has a 40% interest. Major investments are expected to be made in 2018–2019, but the firms will work to start production as soon as possible. Pre-Sal Petroleo SA, or PPSA, a Brazilian government-run firm, will manage development of the country's recently discovered deep-water oil fields. It named Oswaldo Pedrosa as manager of the company on 14 October 2013.

Ownership

The Libra field is owned by a consortium of five companies.

owns 40%,

Royal Dutch Shell Shell plc is a British multinational oil and gas company headquartered in London, England. Shell is a public limited company with a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and secondary listings on Euronext Amsterdam and the New Yo ...

and

Total Total may refer to: Mathematics * Total, the summation of a set of numbers * Total order, a partial order without incomparable pairs * Total relation, which may also mean ** connected relation (a binary relation in which any two elements are comp ...

each hold 20%, and

CNPC The China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) () is a major national oil and gas corporation of China and one of the largest integrated energy groups in the world. Its headquarters are in Dongcheng District, Beijing. CNPC was ranked fourth ...

and

both own 10%. Petrobras also acts as the operator.

Reservoir

The region the reservoir is located in is wide and long. The oil lies under of water and further under sand, rock and shifting salt layer. According to consultancy firm

Gaffney, Cline & Associates Peter Gaffney and Ben Cline, both petroleum engineers working in oil and gas in South America, found they both shared a dream to have their own consultancy. They believed that the oil and gas industry could benefit from independent technical and man ...

the field's reserves are "with the most probable estimate being ".

References

External links

Petrobras official site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Libra Oil Field Oil fields of Brazil Petrobras oil and gas fields

History

Ownership

Reservoir

See also

References

External links