Petrobras to triple crude exports in 2020 - CEO

SINGAPORE, Nov 1 (Reuters) - Petrobras expects to
triple crude exports to between 1.5 million and 1.6 million
barrels per day (bpd) by 2020, with CEO Jose Sergio Gabrielli on
Tuesday naming the United States and China as the firm's key
markets.
The Brazilian state oil firm expects to boost crude output
to 3.9 million bpd by 2015 and 4.9 million bpd by 2020 from 2.1
million bpd this year, which would make Brazil one of the
world's three largest oil producers, Gabrielli said.
"We are forecasting to become a very big net exporter by
2020, not only of oil products but also of crude," Gabrielli
told the Singapore International Energy Week conference.
Petrobras currently exports 520,000 bpd of crude.
Crude oil exports to the United States and China would
double to 400,000-450,000 bpd each, he added.
"China is going to be the same size as the United States.
Right now they are about the same at about 200,000 bpd to
220,000 bpd of exports. That will be growing to about twice that
size. We hope that we can also increase exports to other Asian
countries," he said.
Global fuel consumption would grow around 3-4 percent for
the next five years, Gabrielli said, which would support prices
in the long term.

Petrobras plans to spend more than half of its 2011-2015
capital expenditure of $225 billion to tap the ultra deep-water
subsalt, an area the size of New York state which is believed to
hold at least 50 billion barrels of oil.
Refining, transport and sales activities will account for 31
percent of total investment. "Our main challenge is to extract
resources," Gabrielli said.
The company will ramp up output at its pre-salt Lula field
to 120,000 bpd, up from 36,900 bpd now, when a second well is
added next year, he said.
Petrobras assumes a Brent oil price of between $80 and $95
per barrel for cash flow purposes, Gabrielli said.
"At $80 we can generate $125 billion net cash flow after
payment of dividends and at $95 we can generate $149 billion in
next five years of net cash flow," he said.
To raise funds, Petrobras has also earmarked $13.6 billion
worth of assets to sell as part of the five-year investment
plan.


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Brazil will continue to import gasoline and diesel before
the first of four new refineries start up in 2013, Gabrielli
said.
Gasoline imports tripled this year after ethanol prices
surged while Brazil buys 600,000-1 million bpd of diesel from
India each month, Petrobras executives said.
Four new refineries will add 1.4 million bpd of oil products
output, the CEO said, lifting refinery capacity to around 3.2
million bpd by 2020.
Gabrielli forecast total product exports in 2020 to reach
67,000 bpd.
He said that the company's crude refining will account for
39 percent of Latin America's total projected capacity by 2016.
The vast majority of Petrobras' revenue comes from sales in
Brazil.
Petrobras plans to double its share of Brazil's
ethanol market to 12 percent in 2015 by nearly quadrupling its
ethanol output to 5.6 million cubic metres, Gabrielli said. It
produces 1.5 million cubic metres of ethanol now.


Table of Petrobras refinery projects
Refinery Capacity (bpd) Start-up date
Abreu E Lima 230,000 2013
Comperj (1st train) 165,000 2015
Premium I (1st train) 300,000 2016
Premium II 300,000 2017
Comperj (2nd train) 165,000 2018
Premium I (2nd train) 300,000 2019
Total 1,460,000
Source: Petrobras