Petrobras announces that oil production on February 20th in Petrobras-operated fields in the pre-salt areas of Campos and Santos Basins reached the 300,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd) mark. Of this total, 83% (249,000 bpd) of the total relates to Petrobras' share while the remainder corresponds to the share held by Petrobras' partner companies in the various areas of production in the pre-salt layer.

The production of 300,000 bpd has been reached just seven years after oil was first discovered in the pre-salt layer in 2006. Taking less time to reach this level compared to other major offshore production areas world-wide.

For example, it took 17 years after oil was first discovered to reach a production of 300,000 thousand bpd in the US part of the Gulf of Mexico. It took 11 years in the Campos basin and nine in the North Sea. Unlike these areas, the entire pre-salt oil production takes place in ultra-deep waters which makes this achievement even more remarkable.

Furthermore, the 300,000 bpd mark was achieved with only 17 production wells. This shows the high productivity of the fields discovered in the pre-salt. Of these wells, six are located in Santos Basin, and account for 43% of the production (129,000 bpd). The other 11 wells area located in Campos Basin and account for 57% of the production (171,000 bpd). Natural gas production in these wells is 9.8 million m3 per day.

Average monthly oil production in the pre-sal, for February 2013, has already reached 281 thousand bpd, representing a 138% increase in just 12 months.

Currently, pre-salt production is taking place in eight different platforms, four of which produce exclusively from the pre-salt:

• FPSO Cidade de Angra dos Reis, in operation since October 2010 at Lula field, Santos Basin;

• FPSO Cidade de Anchieta, in operation since September 2012 at Baleia Azul field, Campos Basin;

• FPSO Cidade de São Paulo, in operation since January 2013 at Sapinhoá field, Santos Basin;

• FPSO Cidade de São Vicente, a temporary unit used for carrying out extended well tests, has been in operation since February 2013 at Sapinhoá field, at an area known as Sapinhoá Norte.

The four remaining platforms were installed previously in Campos Basin for post-salt oil production, and given their spare capacity, allowed for pre-salt oil discovery wells to be quickly interconnected.

In May of this year, another platform will go on stream in the Santos Basin pre-salt: FPSO Cidade de Paraty, with processing capacity of 120,000 bpd and 5 million m3 per day of gas. This platform, which is in the final assembly phase in Angra dos Reis, will be installed to the northeast of Lula field, Santos Basin.

Between 2014 and 2016, another 11 new platforms will go on stream for pre-salt production: ten in Santos Basin and one in Campos Basin. This will allow oil production operated by Petrobras in the pre-salt to exceed 1 million barrels of oil per day in 2017.