Thu Jun 3, 2010 12:39pm EDT
* Cuban oil output falls 300,000 tonnes in 2009
* Nat gas output stagnates at 1 million-plus cubic meters
HAVANA, June 3 (Reuters) - Cuba's oil production fell by
almost 300,000 tonnes in 2009 over 2008, while natural gas
output stagnated, the National Statistics Office reported on
Thursday.
Oil production was 2.73 million tonnes and natural gas
output, the equivalent of 1.15 million tonnes, compared with 3
million tonnes and 1.16 million tonnes respectively in 2008,
according to information posted on the office's web page
(here).
Energy dependant, Cuba does not report oil production in
barrels, but officials state it is between 60,000 and 70,000
barrels per day.
The government gave no reason for the decline, though it
coincided with a forced buy-out of concessions owned by
Canadian firms Pebercan and Sherritt International (S.TO).
Pebercan is no longer in Cuba, while Sherritt continues to
operate other blocks.
Cuban production is concentrated along the northwest heavy
oil belt, an 80-mile (128-km) stretch of coast in Havana and
Matanzas provinces which produces all of Cuba's heavy crude
with a density rating of 8 API to 18 API and a high sulfur
content.
Most new wells are drilled vertically from the shore from
two to seven kilometers out to sea.
Output had stagnated for nearly a decade as old wells were
exhausted and new ones did no more than take up the slack.
The poor-quality oil is burned in modified power plants and
factories.
Some domestic oil is also processed at a joint venture
refinery with Venezuela in the Cienfuegos province, and then
exported to area countries.
Since 2006, Cuba has shipped small amounts of the crude to
Asia.
Cuba imported 93,000 bpd of oil and by products, with
preferential financing, from Venezuela in 2008, the last
statistics available, with an additional amount sent to the
Cienfuegos refinery.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0324535620100603?type=marketsNews
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