CAPITAL: LA PAZ
MONETARY UNIT: BOLIVIANO
REFINING CAPACITY: 63,000 B/CD
OIL PRODUCTION: 33,800 B/D
OIL RESERVES: 396.5 MILLION BBL
GAS RESERVES: 18.3 TCF

Bolivia's economic growth was slow but improving in 2000 with foreign investment in the country at historic highs.

Bolivia ended gas exports to Argentina in 1999. It began exporting gas to Brazil through the Bolivia-Brazil pipeline and expected volumes to increase for several years.

Upstream developments

Operators in 1998-99 discovered four giant gas and condensate fields—Itau, San Alberto, San Antonio, and Margarita—with combined reserves of 20 tcf of gas and 400 million bbl of condensate.

TotalFinaElf's Itau field on the Tarija Oeste block by itself held 7.3 tcf and 145 million bbl in Devonian zones at 19,000 ft. BG PLC, which bought Tesoro Petroleum Corp.'s Bolivian operations in late 1999, held 25% of Itau.

The first of the fields went on line as 2001 began. Petrobras, Petrolifera Andina, and Total Bolivia started up San Alberto field and gas processing plant at 230 MMcfd and 1,300 b/d of condensate, all exported to Brazil. The plant is within 20 km of Bolivia's border with Argentina.

Downstream developments

A 70-30 combine of Petrobras and Perez Companc began operating Bolivia's refineries at Cochabamba and Santa Cruz in late 1999.

Start-up of the San Alberto gas processing plant was only the first stage of that project. Initial field output was to expand to 460 MMcfd of gas in 2003 and 775 MMcfd in 2004-05, with concomitant increases in condensate.

Transportation developments involved transnational and domestic gas pipelines.

Enron Inc. affiliates signed short-term and long-term contracts under which a unit of Vintage Petroleum Inc., Tulsa, would supply a combined 69.6 bcf or more of gas from Bolivia to a power project in Brazil and future markets in the Southern Cone of South America.

Vintage said it had hiked its proved reserves to 563 bcf of gas equivalent and production capacity to 50 MMcfd equivalent by yearend 1999 since entering Bolivia in 1996, but it was producing only a net 12 MMcfd in early 2000.

The Bolivia-Brazil gas pipeline, which started up in mid-1999, was said to be operating at far below capacity because industrial markets that had been expected to develop in Brazil during 1999-2000 stalled due to recession.

Bolivia's gas production was estimated at less than 200 MMcfd as 2000 began and about 250 MMcfd later in the year. TotalFinaElf, upon acquiring its stake in the line, said capacity was fully subscribed and expected throughput to rise quickly to around 1 bcfd.