CARACAS -(Dow Jones)- Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PdVSA, gave foreign oil companies access to key geological information as part of a licensing round of heavy-oil fields.
PdVSA delivered "data-packs" to 19 oil companies, one of the initial steps in the first licensing round for Orinoco oil blocks held in a decade, PdVSA and the oil ministry said in a statement late Tuesday. The packs include details of potential deals with PdVSA as well as technical readouts of the areas offered.
Interested companies had to pay $2 million each for access to the data-pack stage. Those who paid include the U.K.'s BP Plc (BP), U.S. oil company Chevron Corp. (CVX), Spain's Repsol YPF SA (REP), Brazil's Petroleo Brasileiro (PBR), Norway's StatoilHydro (STO) and Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSB.LN), as well as companies from Japan, China, Portugal, Colombia, Malaysia and India.
A consortium of Russian oil companies, expected to develop a strong association with PdVSA, is also participating in the process.
Venezuela has opened up three blocks in the Carabobo area of the oil-rich Orinoco region. PdVSA is now offering seven fields located within those blocks for future development with foreign partners.
Once selected, companies would partner with PdVSA in three separate joint venture companies that would pump, upgrade and sell the oil. The ventures would build three upgrading plants that would turn the heavy, sulfurous oil into a more marketable crude for export.
-By Raul Gallegos; Dow Jones Newswires; +58-212-905-6338; raul.gallegos@dowjones.com
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 02, 2008 17:49 ET (22:49 GMT)

Publié le 02 Décembre 2008 Copyright © 2008 Dowjones