UK oil company reveals “significant” pre‑salt oil discovery
British oil company BP Energy announced Monday (Aug. 4) the discovery of an oil reservoir in the pre-salt Santos basin, off the coast of Rio de Janeiro. The well, in the Bumerangue block, is at a depth of 5,855 meters. This is the company’s biggest discovery in 25 years.
“We are thrilled to report this significant discovery in Bumerangue, BP’s largest in 25 years,” said BP’s executive vice-president for production and operations, Gordon Birrell.
The giant’s plan, he said, is to “establish a material and advantaged production hub in the country.”
The exploratory well is 404km off the coast of Rio de Janeiro.
According to BP, the drilling cut through a column of hydrocarbons in a “high quality” pre-salt reservoir with an extension of over 300km².
The company reported that the first analysis results from the probe indicate high levels of carbon dioxide. The company will conduct new assessments to better characterize the potential of the block.
The pre-salt—reservoirs five to seven kilometers deep—are the main known source of oil in Brazil, responsible for 78.8 percent of all of the country’s production, as per the latest official data, from June.
It took three years
The British multinational holds a 100-percent stake in the block, which was won in December 2022 in an auction by Brazil’s oil authority ANP. Under the sharing contract signed with the Brazilian government, BP Energy undertook to cede 5.9 percent of the surplus oil to the government—on behalf of the state-owned company Pré-Sal Petróleo S.A.—after paying the costs.
BP is also involved in oil exploration in eight offshore blocks, and is the operator in four of them. The next planned exploration campaign is in the Tupinambá block, also in the Santos pre-salt basin, in 2026. The area was won at an ANP auction with a bid of BRL 7.04 million in 2023.
