28-08-06 Brazil's state-owned Petroleo Brasileiro (Petrobras) oil company said it wants to forge a partnership with its Mexican counterpart for deep-water oil exploration and production.
"We're ready to take on risks as we already have all the knowledge in deep waters," Petrobras chief financial officer Almir Barbassa told on the sidelines of a seminar. "It would make total sense to work together with Pemex."

Mexico also needs to find new oil sources -- and state-owned Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) sees deep-water exploration as the long-term answer to replacing reserves and output, particularly as its main oil-producing Cantarell field has started to decline. Currently Mexican law prohibits private or foreign companies from ownership of any oil or gas concessions.
Days after Mexico's presidential election in July, ruling party candidate Felipe Calderon said he was interested in learning about deep-water exploration and production from Petrobras, which has considerable experience in the area.

Petrobras and Pemex already have a service provider contract, and Petrobras is familiar with the Gulf of Mexico after drilling dozens of wells in US waters, where it expects to produce 100,000 barrels of oil a day by 2010. Barbassa said Petrobras would like to partner with Pemex soon, but that the issue depends on Mexican politics.
Mexico's top electoral court began a marathon session to rule on challenges to the presidential election. Calderon's top challenger, leftist former Mexico City Mayor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is opposed to Pemex forming an alliance for deep-water oil.

Barbassa's comments came after another Petrobras executive told that the Brazilian company is prepared to send drilling rigs and investments to Mexico's Gulf Coast waters if Calderon succeeds in changing Mexican laws to allow Pemex to form an alliance.