Bidding on Brazil’s first licensing round since 2008 finished yesterday with rights to 142 exploration areas sold for a record $1.4billion (£920million).
It has been estimated that undiscovered reserves in the Campos and Santos basins, an extension of the area where giant reserves were found in 2007, may contain as much as 100billion barrels.
In total, 39 companies from 12 countries won bids, which are mostly for fields situated in high-risk frontier regions with little or no current oil output.
Among the biggest winners were BG Group, which offered to pay £135million for stakes in 10 blocks and France’s Total, which agreed to pay £121million for a share in another 10.
Norwegian Statoil also bid on six licences in the Espirito Santo area, of which Statoil will be the operator for four and a partner in two.
Tim Dodson, executive vice president for exploration in Statoil, said: “The award of the blocks in the Espirito Santo Basin is in line with Statoil’s exploration strategy to build on core positions in prolific and proven basins.”
BP and partners Total, Petrobras and Petrogal won bids for eight deepwater blocks, with BP becoming operator in two of them.
Mike Daly, BP’s executive vice president of exploration, said: “It will increase our frontier exploration exposure along Brazil’s equatorial margin and plays to our strengths in deepwater. We look forward to a successful exploration programme working with our partners Total, Petrobras and Petrogal.”
AIM-listed Chariot Oil and Gas also said it had won a total of four operatorships in the Barreirinhas basin.
Oil companies from fast-growing Asian nations, though stayed away. Only Malaysia’s Petronas, which recently bought a stake in an OGX field was very active, but it won no blocks.
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