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Brazil's Crude Oil Production Increased by 5.5% in 2020
According to the BNAmericas website, data from the Brazilian Petroleum Administration (ANP) showed that in 2020, Brazil's crude oil production was 2.94 million barrels per day, exceeding the UAE, the third largest oil producer in OPEC, with an annual production of 2.779 million barrels per day, an increase of 5.5% from 2.785 million barrels per day in the previous year.In 2019, Brazil's crude oil production was 300,000 barrels per year less than the UAE, but it was 107,000 barrels more than Kuwait, the world's fourth largest oil producer after Saudi Arabia, Iraq and the UAE. Brazil's production growth was mainly driven by the National Oil Company (Petrobras), which has put into production in the past 10 years in the Tupi and Buzios subsalt fields in the Santos Basin.
With four floating production storage and offloading vessels (FPSOs) in operation, Buzios has replaced Sapinhoá as Brazil's second largest oil field and will become the largest oil field as Petrobras plans to install eight new production platforms in the area. Petrobras' 2021-25 strategic plan foresees 13 FPSOs coming online, including four new ones in Buzios. Guanabara at Mero and Carioca at Sepia are scheduled to come online this year.
Meanwhile, Equinor and Shell's Bacalhau and Gato do Mato offshore fields are set to come online in the next decade.
However, Brazil's oil production has not yet reached pre-pandemic levels. In January 2020, the country's crude oil production hit a record 3.1 million barrels per day.
A recent report by S&P Global Platts predicts that Brazil's crude oil production will increase by 120,000 barrels per day in 2021 and 150,000 barrels per day in 2022, driven by the commissioning and increase of pre-salt fields.
ANP expects offshore oil production to be 3.08 million barrels per day and onshore oil production to be 97,000 barrels per day in 2021.
According to ANP data, the country's natural gas production was 127 million cubic meters per day in 2020, an increase of 4.1% over the previous year. Offshore and onshore production in 2021 were 108 million cubic meters per day and 21 million cubic meters per day, respectively.
