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To: Taikun who wrote (2007)	8/24/2005 9:15:52 AM
From: jrzyl	Respond to of 25575

Interesting story on Venezuela with some info on some 300B bbls heavy crude resources with 4 projects already in place. quote.bloomberg.com Some excerpts: ….>The prize in Venezuela is the tropical flatlands north of the Orinoco River, beneath which, according to Chavez, lie 230 billion barrels of heavy crude, one of the largest oil deposits in the world. ----Chevron and Repsol YPF SA, Spain's biggest oil company, plan to seek approval for a $6 billion expansion in the Orinoco Belt, as the area is known. Shell, Europe's second-biggest oil company, proposes a $5 billion expansion there. ----``The oil industry is a long-term industry, and you can't have an attitude of `in and out,''' says Ali Moshiri, 52, Chevron's Latin America exploration and development chief. ``We have to go where the oil is.'' …< ..> In October 2004, the government raised royalties on four heavy- oil production projects along the Orinoco Belt to 16.67 percent from 1 percent and slapped a 30 percent royalty on excess output…< ..> Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest publicly traded oil company, faces higher royalties on its Cerro Negro heavy-oil field in the Orinoco Belt, which produces 120,000 barrels of crude per day. ..< ..> Chavez's Venezuela is one of the few major oil producers that allow foreign investment; Saudi Arabia allows only its state oil company to pump crude. …………………….And Venezuela has been more open than other countries in Latin America such as Mexico, which bars foreign companies from exploiting the second-biggest oil reserves in Latin America…< …>Norway's state-run Statoil ASA, Paris-based Total SA and Chevron have been the hardest hit by Chavez's new rules because they manage wells for PDVSA and are shareholders in the four heavy-crude production ventures in the Orinoco belt. -----Statoil, Total and ConocoPhillips may have to pay $320 million of back taxes for their heavy-oil ventures in the Orinoco belt, according to Oil Minister Ramirez. …< …>Chevron and Repsol still plan to expand in the Orinoco area, a project that would include drilling as many as 2,000 wells that use steam to force tarlike crude oil out of the ground. ---The Orinoco Belt, with as many as 300 billion barrels of oil, may be a critical area for Chevron to add reserves, Moshiri says. -----The companies plan to submit their proposal to the Oil Ministry in the first quarter of 2006 and start negotiations quickly. Within five years, the project could be producing 400,000 barrels a day, Moshiri says. ….< >>On the dark, brackish waters of Lake Maracaibo, a lake connected to the Caribbean by the Gulf of Venezuela, where derricks stretch to the horizon, PDVSA estimates it will take six years and billions of dollars to recoup production lost to broken- down wells and pipelines. ------Three miles below the lake bottom are reserves that account for one-third of the crude oil Venezuela produces every day. ------On one day in late June, dozens of wells were idle, rusting away and stuck in mid-operation on one part of the lake near the city of Maracaibo. Leaky pipelines produced oil slicks that threw off a kaleidoscope of colors in the 40-degree-Celsius (104-degree- Fahrenheit) tropical heat. -----A 16-kilometer-long drift of lime-green duckweed algae encircles some wells, thriving in the polluted waters. Former PDVSA board member Jose Toro Hardy, who's now an independent oil analyst, says the delays in recovering production are indicative of disorder in the state company since the strike. -----`Silver Bullet' - ``The delays make it very difficult for them to increase output,'' Hardy says. -------Moshiri says he's confident Chevron and Repsol can negotiate an agreement that will allow them to use their expertise to run the wells, pipelines and refineries planned for the Orinoco. ``Our objective is in line with what their objective is,'' Moshiri says.----`If Venezuela is looking for large increases in production, the silver bullet is the Orinoco,'' he says. <<

To: Taikun who wrote (2007)	8/24/2005 9:36:03 AM
From: Claude	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 25575

Taikun, Interesting radio show on NPR last night regarding the Irag situation. Retired US general talking about stalemate situation in Iraq and nothing left to do but pull out and let them at each other in civil war. While I think thats radical and the US will stay and try to achieve a better outcome the likelihood of a destabilized middle east is perhaps the likeliest scenario. With a destabilized (yeah right what do you call it now?) ME I think oil sands value rises substantially. Throw in Chavez and well... Claude