Mexico Strikes Oil Under Sea
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MEXICO CITY — Mexican President Vicente Fox said Monday that his country had made a new deep-water oil discovery in the Gulf of Mexico that could exceed reserves at the giant offshore field Cantarell, Mexico’s largest oil source.
The find, to be formally announced today, is under 3,117 feet of water as well as 13,120 feet of earth, Fox said in an interview.
“We have been investing $5 billion a year in exploration, and that work, that investment, is now bearing fruit,” Fox said.
Production at Cantarell is expected to decline 6% this year to 1.9 million barrels a day and decline even more sharply in subsequent years.
Fox said state oil monopoly Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, had hired a private company to drill the well and the result “indicates reserves that exceed those of Cantarell.”
Pemex sees deep-water crude as one of its best bets for replacing reserves and increasing production as Cantarell declines.
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