State-owned Pemex has made a “very large” oil discovery in Tabasco, according to Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. The President mentioned the discovery briefly during a regular morning news conference but gave no further details on the find. Pemex Chief Executive Octavio Romero Oropeza gave a bit more color in a later interview with the Mexican broadcasting system.
The new field, when combined with nearby deposits, is similar in size to other billion-barrel discoveries, said Romero.
“It’s a gigantic field,” he said, comparing it to the recently discovered Quesqui gas and condensate fields, with estimated reserves of 900 million BOE, as well as Ixachi, estimated to hold 1.9 billion BOE. Pemex is expected to provide more details regarding the new discovery on 18 March, the anniversary of the 1938 nationalization of the oil industry, according to Reuters.
The find is a welcomed addition to a company that has struggled over the past decade-plus to add reserves and offset its sinking production. It failed to reach its output goal for 2020 of 1.84 million B/D, holding steady at its 2019 average of 1.7 million B/D. Pemex has also been wracked by debt. Its current level, $113 billion, is the highest of any major oil company.
The oil company has also been hit hard by COVID-19, losing around 500 employees and contractors to complications from the virus, one of the highest death tolls of any company in the world.