PdVSA Exec: Getting Outside Help With Refineries

Marin? Tuesday March 25, 5:19 AM

Venezuelan Ambassador to the U.S. Bernardo Alvarez said Venezuela has been talking to many companies interested in using its crude to help fill the SPR. "What's important is that we have the political will to contribute," Alvarez said.

The ambassador said Venezuela plans to discuss its production levels with the U.S. Energy Information Administration to try to persuade the statistical agency its oil output has recovered to pre-December levels.

Marin said PdVSA is in talks with refinery services company UOP LLC and it's getting technical assistance from Mitsubishi Corp. (J.MIB) to resume full operations at the El Palito refinery. He said that plans for a liquefied natural gas export development by Royal Dutch/Shell Group (RD) and Mitsubishi remain "very serious."

Marin described the loss since November of about 17,000 PdVSA staff, or 43% of the prior workforce, as largely complementing the company's prior plans to downsize, but he said he would have preferred not being forced to restructure the company by December's labor walkouts.

Among structural changes the oil monopoly has made are reducing its Caracas corporate headquarters to no more than 400 staff and shifting responsibilities to its eastern and western producing regions, he said. PdVSA is forming a sales division in the east to handle all crude oil marketing and another in the west to handle all refined products marketing, he said.

Marin said he expects Venezuelan crude oil production to reach about 3.1 million b/d over the next few months. Venezuela has an understanding within the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to produce above its quota of 2.819 million b/d to make up for the exports it lost in December and January.

-By Campion Walsh, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-9291; campion.walsh@dowjones.com