The Mexican oil company Pemex confirmed Friday, December 6, the existence of a "Gigantic deposit" half a billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe) in the south-east of the country.
The discovery, which consists of proven, probable and possible reserves, would be the largest for the group since 1987, when the Sen deposit (536 million BOE) was discovered in the same state of Tabasco, detailed Pemex. This new oil field, called Quesqui, is spread over 34 km2.
Pemex hopes to launch in 2020 a production of 69,000 barrels per day of oil and 300 million cubic feet of natural gas, with 11 wells. By 2021, it would rise to 110,000 barrels of oil, and 410 million cubic feet of gas.
A colossal debt
Three other new fields (Cibix, Valeriana and Chocol) are still being developed in this state of Tabasco, where President Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador was born.
To get out of its financial difficulties, Pemex, the largest company in Mexico, must relaunch its production, down to 1.6 million barrels per day against 3.4 million in 2004. The company however has reduced margins to invest plummeted by a debt of about 100 billion dollars.
The government of Lopez Obrador, in power since December 2018, has invested some $ 10 billion (about 9 billion euros) to rectify the accounts of this group considered strategic. But the problems are far from being solved: in the third quarter alone, Pemex posted a net loss of $ 4.6 billion.
