By Lise Alves, Senior Contributing Reporter
SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL – Brazilian oil giant Petrobras surpassed its annual petroleum production target for the first time in thirteen years in 2015, producing a volume of 2.128 million barrels per day, according to the company. The annual average production in the pre-salt layer was the largest in history, surpassing 2014 production by 56 percent.
“The result is important to demonstrate the company’s large operational capacity, even in an adverse global scenario for the oil and gas sector,” stated Petrobras President, Aldemir Bendine, in a press release on Friday. Bendine also noted that the result reinforces the company’s decision to prioritize investments that will generate results for the company, especially projects in exploration and production.
The increase in petroleum production volume in 2015, of 4.6 percent in relation to 2014, also surpassed the 2015-2019 plan forecast by the company for the year. In addition to an increase in petroleum, the company is also celebrating an increase in natural gas extraction, by 9.8 percent in relation to 2014, with a total production equivalent to 2.6 million barrels per day.
According to company officials the increase in production last year was partly due to the increase in production of platform P-58 in the Parque das Baleias complex, in the Campos Basin and the FPSO Cidade de Mangaratiba, in the pre-salt layer at the Santos basin.
“We have consolidated our excellence in deep and ultra-deep waters,” stated Solange Guedes, director of Exploration and Production at Petrobras. “In 2015 we were able to reconcile technological advances with the reduction of operational costs, which led us to an extraction cost of eight dollars per barrel in sub-salt fields in the third quarter.”
Last week the country’s oil giant announced it was reducing by 25 percent, or US$32 billion, its investments until 2019.