Old oilfields have a trend to decline and we are making efforts to avoid that, said Hercilio Rivas, PDVSA’s internal director for research and development.
The official stressed that the oil recovery factor is about 25%. In the Orinoco oil belt it is only 10%.
Rivas said that capital spending plans in 2009 remains unchanged at $12 billion.
He added that PDVSA has muscle and is very powerful, and stressed that the company has the capability to meet commitments related to nationalizations.
Rivas also refuseed the production figures given by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) and the International Energy Agency, claiming that they are not true.
For his part, former chief economist of PDVSA Ramon Espinasa said that Venezuela needs to spend $9.5 billion to counteract the decline and raise the production capacity in traditional regions.
In Espinasa’s view, PDVSA has a controlled capacity in engineering and access to technology.
