Cuba currently produces about 45,000 barrels per day of heavy oil and 2.7 million cubic metres per day of gas from its Northern Oil Belt (NOB).

The producing fields lie just offshore and are accessed by extended reach wells up to seven kilometres long drilled from shore.

Their reservoirs are Late Jurassic carbonates with Tertiary shale seals and Jurassic source rocks.

Osvaldo Lopez Corzo, state-owned Cupet’s E&P manager, said the fields produce 8 to 15 degrees API oil with recovery rates of only 5% to 7%, which the state-owned player aims to improve within two years via applications such as steam injection and water flooding.

However, he pointed out that a recent discovery in the NOB hit light oil, which bodes well for new plays in this play as well as having implications for the acreage offered in the licensing round.

The Bacuranao-300 discovery, located 15 kilometres east of Havana, has so far produced 500,000 barrels of 22.6 degrees API crude and “we are now drilling appraisal wells,” said Corzo.

Estimated recoverable reserves stand at between 70 million and 90 million barrels of oil.

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Cupet aims to boost recovery rates