Brazil Will Use Offshore Oil Revenue To Eradicate Poverty, Lula Says
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said, Brazil will direct future revenues from recent discoveries of deep-water crude reserves in so-called pre-salt which lie 16,400 feet and 22,966 feet below sea level, toward education and combating poverty.
Speaking in a nationally-broadcast, commemorating Brazil’s independence from Portugal in 1822, Lula said “The priority for the resources from pre-salt fields will be education and the eradication of poverty, We’ll turn perishable wealth, such as oil and gas, into a permanent source of wealth for the Brazilian people”
“Brazil doesn’t want to be a mere exporter of crude oil, President Lula said. “To the contrary, we want to add value to the petroleum here, exporting derivatives, which are worth more.” He said the government did not yet have a precise estimate of the size of the reserves in the pre-salt area, but said that the find would place Brazil “among the largest producers of oil and gas in the world.”
The former metal worker, who has spoken about oil almost daily in recent weeks said that with the find the government planned to promote a “powerful and sophisticated oil industry” in the country by consolidating the rebirth of the naval industry, developing petrochemical technology and re-enforcing the state-controlled oil company Petrobras (PBR). He said that in coming years, the country would build five new oil refineries, dozens of oil exploration platforms and hundreds of ships.
Lula praised State-controlled firm Petrobras for finding the oil and said developing the deposits will be another challenge it would meet. Pumping the oil from under a thick layer of salt up to 4.5 miles under the sea will cost hundreds of billions of dollars as well as require cutting-edge technology. Petrobras and foreign firms already operating in the area, such as ExxonMobil Corp and Shell are now waiting anxiously for Lula’s administration to unveil new rules to govern the oil bonanza. The area is scheduled to go into production after 2010