Petrobras’ Proven Reserves in 2015
Petrobras announces its proven reserves of petroleum (oil, condensate and natural gas), assessed at the end of 2015 according to ANP/SPE (National Petroleum, Natural Gas and Biofuels Agency / Society of Petroleum Engineers) and SEC (US Securities and Exchange Commission) criteria.
Proven Reserves according to ANP/SPE Criteria:
According to ANP/SPE criteria, on December 31, 2015, Petrobras´ proven oil, condensate and natural gas reserves reached 13.279 billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe), as shown in Table 1. In 2014, it was 16.612 billion boe.
Table 2 presents the evolution of proven reserves in 2015, according to ANP/SPE criteria:
The main factors impacting the reserves were:
• The incorporation of 0.016 billion boe of proven reserves related to the discovery of new accumulations close to existing infrastructure in the Albacora Leste field in the Campos Basin, the Golfinho field in the Espírito Santo Basin and the El Mangrullo field in the Neuquina Basin, in Argentina;
• Additions to proven reserves in the pre-salt production fields in the Santos and Campos Basins, resulting from positive responses to reservoir behavior, recovery mechanisms (e.g. water injection), the operating efficiency of the systems in operation and growing drilling activity and well linkage;
• Appropriations due to the drilling of production development wells in onshore fields in in Argentina and in the Amazonas and Potiguar Basins, in Brazil, and in offshore fields in the Campos Basin;
• The declaration of commerciality of the Jandaia Sul field in Bahia;
• Divestments that provided early monetization of 0.022 billion boe of reserves in Brazil (Campos Basin) and Argentina (Austral Basin);
• Production of 0.932 billion boe in 2015, which represents an increase of 4% from 2014. This volume includes the production of shale but does not include the volume extracted from the Extended Well Tests (EWT) nor the production in Bolivia. EWTs occur in exploratory areas, which has not yet been declared commerciality of the field, so there is no associated reserves and, in the case of Bolivia, the country's legislation does not allow that reservations be recorded by the concessionaire.
Petrobras presented a reduction of 2.401 billion boe in proven reserves because of other factors than the extraction of oil and natural gas, as monetization of reserves and revisions, which equates to approximately 2.58 times the annual production. The ratio between the volume of reserves and production volume is 14.2 years, 14.6 years of which in Brazil. The Development Ratio (DR), which is the ratio between developed proven reserves and total proven reserves, came to 44.5 in 2015.
Proven Reserves according to SEC Criteria:
According to SEC reserves classification and appropriation criteria, on December 31, 2015, Petrobras´ proven oil, condensate and natural gas reserves reached 10.516 billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe), as shown in Table 3. In 2014, these volumes were 13.141 billion boe, including shale reserves.
The same highlights previously made for proven reserves according to ANP/SPE criteria, applied to proven reserves, according to SEC criteria.
The main difference between the ANP/SPE and SEC criteria are sale prices considered in the calculation of the economic viability of the reserves.
By SEC criteria, Petrobras presented a reduction of 1.692 billion boe in their proven reserves due to factors other than the extraction of oil and natural gas, as monetization of reserves and revisions, which equates to approximately 1.82 times the annual production. The ratio between the volume of the reserves and the volume produced is 11.3 years, 11.5 years of which in Brazil. The Development Ratio (DR), the ratio between developed proven reserves and total proven reserves, of 51.1% in 2015.
It is important mentioning that Petrobras historically certifies about 95% of its proven reserves according to SEC criteria. Currently, D&M (DeGolyer and MacNaughton) is the certifying entity.
