Caribbean & Central America - October 2011 (ISSN 1741-4458)

The new energy ministry will oversee the offshore deepwater oil sector, long Cuba’s great white hope. Cuba believes it could have up to 20bn barrels in offshore oil reserves in the Cuban zone of the deepwater Florida Straits between Cuba and Key West. It currently produces about 60,000 barrels of oil per day from onshore wells and imports about 115,000 b/d from Venezuela, on favourable terms. The state oil company Cubapetróleo has partnered with Spain’s Repsol, along with the likes of Italy’s Eni, Norway’s Statoil, and state companies from Russia and China, with seven deepwater exploration wells planned by the end of next year. Repsol expects to have an exploration rig in place by the end of the year. It circumvented the 10% limit on US technology set down under the US-Cuba embargo by purchasing an Italian made semi-submersible rig, which was built in China. The rig is now en route to Cuba from Singapore and should be in place by mid December

End of preview - This article contains approximately 166 words.

Subscribers: Log in now to read the full article

Not a Subscriber?

Choose from one of the following options

• Subscribe
• Sign up for a one-time, 14-day trial