2 U.S. Firms Get Pemex Contracts : Mexico: The new drilling deals signal a further easing of the state’s control of its oil industry.

In its nine-year drive to privatize government-owned industries, Mexico has remained steadfast in keeping its national oil company under state control.

But a series of drilling contracts awarded to private firms last week provides new evidence that the government is gradually loosening its 54-year grip on the oil industry--including increasing the participation of foreign firms--primarily because Mexico needs private expertise to help replenish its oil reserves, to satisfy growing demand for refined gasoline and to efficiently exploit all of its petroleum resources.

Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, as the national oil company is known, awarded contracts worth $210 million to four private companies to drill 22 offshore production wells in Campeche Sound, a giant field in southern Mexico that has yielded the most productive wells in recent years for Pemex.

The drilling orders were the largest group Pemex has made available to foreign firms for bidding. American firms receiving awards were Dallas-based Triton Energy, which received a contract for $32 million, and Houston-based Sonat Offshore Drilling, which was part of a joint venture with Mexico’s EPN that received a $43.7-million contract.

The remaining contracts were awarded to Mexico’s Faja de Oro and Protexa companies.

In addition to last week’s contracts, Pemex has undertaken a series of actions designed to delegate a larger share of the responsibility for Mexico’s jealously guarded petroleum industry to private companies:

- It plans to close or sell an unspecified number of its 60 petrochemical plants and will seek private partners to invest in upgrading the rest, according to Jaime Mario Willars, head of Pemex’s petrochemical division.

- The company has announced that it is looking for a buyer for 51% of a Pemex subsidiary that markets motor oils and lubricants.

- Pemex is negotiating with San Francisco-based Chevron, Conoco of Houston and Baton Rouge, La.-based Transamerica Natural Gas for a joint venture refinery in the United States. Pemex refining general manager Fernando Manzanillo said the company is trying for an arrangement similar to a prior agreement with Shell USA awarding Pemex half the production of Shell’s Deer Park refinery in Houston in exchange for Pemex supplying the refinery’s crude oil.

Mexico must increase its refining capacity, or increase current imports of 75,000 barrels of gasoline a day, which contributes $600 million a year to Mexico’s trade deficit. Demand is growing by 5% a year, and tighter environmental standards have forced Pemex to supply gasoline with more sophisticated additives.

Pemex has plans to expand an existing refinery in Salina Cruz, in southern Mexico, and to build a new refinery in central Mexico. However, construction is not scheduled to begin until 1994.

Oil has been a powerful symbol of sovereignty and nationalism in Mexico since the industry was nationalized in 1938. But the rhetoric of nationalism is noticeably absent from the discussions of general managers at the recently reorganized Pemex. These days, talk in the 43-story headquarters tower is about maximizing value and cost savings.

The willingness to contract with private firms and to enter into joint ventures reflects pressing financial concerns.

It is estimated that Pemex needs $20 billion in oil industry investment from 1991 to 1996. Over the past two years the company has raised funds through borrowing in international markets, but the government’s drive for balanced federal budgets has forced Pemex to limit its debt.

Mexico must replenish its shrinking oil reserves or face the prospect of becoming an oil importer, perhaps within seven years, some analysts predict. And, it needs the expertise of private partners to exploit its resources. The most promising areas for offshore drilling are in the deep waters of the Campeche Sound, where difficult weather conditions make the Pemex equipment used to drill other parts of the Gulf of Mexico obsolete.

“Exploring this area would have required additional resources, more drilling equipment and Petroleos Mexicanos’ current policy is not to invest in such equipment, but to contract for it,” said Manuel Ortiz de Maria, general manager for exploration and development.