http://english.cri.cn/6826/2012/12/16/2361s738687.htm
2012-12-16 04:21:08 Xinhua Web Editor: Wang Wei
A new platform will be used to further explore the waters to the north of Cuba’s central region for oil, state oil company Cubapetroleo (CUPET) said Saturday.
The Norwegian oil rig, Songa Mercur, will start to drill the well L-01X in the next few days under a contract signed with Russian company Zarubezhneft, according to a release from the company published in the official Cuban Communist Party newspaper Granma.
“As usual, this platform received inspections by CUPET experts and Cuban regulatory authorities to ensure that the operations are conducted with maximum safety and without damage to the environment,” it said.
The new rig replaces the oil platform Scarabeo 9, which left for North Africa on Nov. 14. The operation is scheduled to last approximately six months.
The well, with a depth of 6,500 meters, will be the deepest so far drilled in Cuba.
The oil rig was under inspection to verify that less than 10 percent of its components are manufactured in the United States, a restriction imposed by the U.S. as part of its economic sanctions against the island.
Cuba estimates about 20 billion barrels of oil reserves in its exclusive economic zone at the Gulf of Mexico, but the U.S Geologic Service considers a more modest figure of about 5 billion to 9 billion barrels.
The platform Songa Mercur is owned by the Norwegian company Songa Offshore and has all the necessary means to ensure the work to be done efficiently and safely, the release said.
Scarabeo 9, the previous oil rig, was also inspected by US experts in waters of Trinidad and Tobago, with the permit of the Spanish company Repsol, which had hired the platform.
Russian sources said that the first result of the operation will be announced in May 2013. Zarubezhneft, president of the directing board, Nikolai Brunich, traveled to Cuba in November as part of a high level delegation, which visited the Songa Mercur after its arrival in the island.
This will be the fourth exploratory trial, after the failure of the Scarabeo 9, which operated in three different blocks hired in consecutive occasions by the Spanish company Repsol, the Malaysian PC Gulf, the Russian group Gazprom Neft, and the Venezuelan state- owned PDVSA.
Since 2003, Cuba produces annually 21 million oil barrels and 1. 1 million cubic meters of natural gas, but this figure covers only half of its domestic power needs.
To compensate the other 50 percent, the island receives 10,000 oil barrels daily from Venezuela, its main political and economic ally, and the strongest oil power in the region. However, that supply has raised concerns after Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez had to go through a complicated fourth anticancer surgery in Havana, the capital of Cuba, including the removal of two vertebras of his backbone, and his previous announced warning on the possibility that he could not continue in office.
Special thanks to Richard Charter