CUPET Announces Cuba's First Licensing Round for Offshore Blocks

Union Cuba-Petroleo (CUPET) has announced Cuba's First Licensing Round and has invited oil companies interested in carrying out exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbon activities in the Economic Exclusive Zone (EEZ) of the Cuban sector in the Gulf of Mexico to present offers for one or more blocks, under Production Sharing Agreements (PSA).

A total of 24 blocks are on offer in the licensing round and all existing information and data packages will be available for registered and qualified companies. Additionally, the offered area is widely covered by recent BGP 2D multiclient high resolution seismic. Data packages are available from BGP upon request, as well as the possibility to access Data Rooms in specialized events or online.

Additionally, the possibility to participate in existing farm-out projects remains open by direct negotiation with operating companies. Companies may participate independently or associated in trusts of two or more companies.

The Gulf of Mexico is one of the most prolific and prospective offshore areas in the world. Cuba produces around 60000 BOE/day from the western offshore by drilling extended-reach wells through duplex structures in the Folded and Thrusted Belt.

Reservoirs are basically fractured and lixiviated carbonates from Late Jurassic. The seals are lithologically composed by Tertiary shale, while source rocks are Jurassic deep water clayey carbonate facies.

In 2012, three exploration wells were drilled in this area, targets were focused on Cretaceous carbonates and no commercial oil was discovered; however, all wells had oil shows which according to biomarkers were originated in Late Jurassic source rocks. Thus proving the extension of this unit in the offshore.

New 2017 2D BGP multiclient seismic provided valuable information concerning basement depth, and sedimentary thickness. Besides, useful data was obtained as deep as 7-9 sec (~10-12 km) to determine with high accuracy the boundaries between different exploration scenarios and the seismic stratigraphic sketch for regional interpretation, exploratory play types could be re-defined.

In addition, new areas with huge potential for petroleum systems occurrence were determined.

By mapping several leads in a first interpretation stage resources are estimated in more than 10 billion barrels of recoverable oil, with expected qualities of 25-35° API.