A Former ANP Employee Said Brazil Needs to License New Exploratory Frontiers Because the Pre-Salt Is Running Out.

Décio Oddone Challenged Industry Leaders to Highlight the Challenges of Obtaining Environmental Licenses for Promising Pre-Salt Regions and Other Unexplored Areas

There is not much pre-salt left. At a conference in Brasília on Wednesday, Décio Oddone, former director of the National Petroleum Agency (ANP) and current president of Enauta, warned that pre-salt exploration shows signs of fatigue. Although the Equatorial Margin and the basins of the Mouth of the Amazon and Pelotas are very promising as new frontiers for oil exploration in Brazil, the challenge was directed at industry leaders to draw attention to the difficulties in obtaining environmental licenses for these areas.

He was emphatic in saying that Brazil has exhausted the last frontier of initiatives that can be started and completed in the coming years. What will happen to oil exploration in Brazil after the pre-salt? Oddone, speaking at an event called “Future and Perspectives of the Oil and Gas Sector in Brazil”, organized by the Brazilian Institute of Oil and Gas (IBP), said: “We don’t know, [at least] it’s not clear”. According to him, it has been ten years since the sector has obtained an environmental license to explore unknown territories.

VIDEO: WHAT IS THE PRE-SALT?

Although Oddone predicted the success of the ANP, he forecasted for the sector that “the era of billion-dollar auctions” was coming to an end. The announcement came at the beginning of the sixth round of auctions promoted by the agency, which still held substantial reserves in the pre-salt polygon. Many of the more recent wells drilled have failed. Exploration in the area “was a negative surprise, but it is a reality,” he stated.

If Brazil is not going to open new areas for oil exploration, the former ANP director argues, it should come from a “conscious decision”, after a “serious debate”, and not just postpone the issuance of environmental licenses. According to him, the difficulty of this conversation is how the country will continue to fund social policies and generate money without the economic gains from the sector, given the revenues of the Union, States, and municipalities from royalties and taxes.

More Investments in Brazil’s Energy Sector, Including the Pre-Salt

Oddone claims that Brazil is struggling to keep pace with the necessary energy sector investments to reach a daily production of about 5 million barrels by the end of this decade. Extracting this volume, largely from pre-salt reservoirs, will propel the country to the position of the fifth-largest oil exporter in the world.

The former ANP director said it is “acceptable” for Brazil to prohibit drilling in environmentally fragile locations such as the Abrolhos (BA) and Fernando de Noronha (PE) archipelagos. “Today you have to be agile in the areas you choose to explore”, he said.

Via Valor, O Globo.