Brazil’s decision on whether to join the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries is up to Brazil’s government, said Sergio Gabrielli, chief executive of state-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA Petrobras, Saturday.

Yet, asked whether production quotas in case of a future Brazilian OPEC
membership could harm the company, Gabrielli hinted on that those may
not affect Petrobras too much.

While Petrobras plans to greatly increase its oil output, it will try
to also push higher the refining of crude and with that output of its
oil products, which isn’t subject to OPEC quotas, he said.

Petrobras plans to increase the crude processing capacity at its
Brazilian refineries from a current 1.8 million barrels a day to more
than 3 million barrels a day by 2020, he said.

“We’ll try to transform ourselves into a country with a higher oil
derivatives production, not only a higher oil production,” he said.

Brazil’s Mines and Energy Minister Edison Lobao had told Dow Jones
Newswires in March that his country may consider joining OPEC once it
becomes a major oil exporter.

Petrobras, which accounts for more than 90% of Brazil’s oil output, in
the third quarter produced on average 1.97 million barrels of oil a day
from its Brazilian fields, roughly meeting the country’s own demand
with its production.

Petrobras expects its domestic oil and gas output to rise to above 5 million BOE a day by 2020.

Source: Market Watch

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