Oxy discovers large oil field in Kern
| Wednesday, Jul 22 2009 07:44 PM
Last Updated Wednesday, Jul 22 2009 07:44 PM
Occidental Petroleum Corp. on Wednesday announced its discovery of a large oil field in Kern County, a find experts say could boost local employment, increase tax revenues and reduce the state’s reliance on imported oil.
Based on preliminary exploration, Los Angeles-based Oxy said it believes the reserves contain the equivalent of 150-250 million barrels of oil. That’s about one-tenth of the state’s on-shore oil reserves, or about a year’s worth of California oil production, according to state officials.
Comparisons can be tricky, given Oxy’s estimate that about two-thirds of the new field is actually natural gas. But industry and government officials described the find as significant.
“We haven’t had a discovery of this magnitude in 35 years” in California, said Joe Sparano, president of the Western States Petroleum Association trade group.
“It’s huge,” Bakersfield oilman Chad Hathaway said, adding “I’m curious to know where it’s at.”
Oxy spokespeople declined to discuss the discovery beyond its written announcement, which did not say where or when the field was discovered, but Oxy said “it is probable” that more oil remains to be discovered nearby.
Oxy is the state’s largest producer of natural gas and its third-largest oil producer. The company said it has a roughly 80 percent ownership stake in the new field.
A spokeswoman for the California Energy Commission said the discovery could be valuable not only because it would increase the domestic fuel supply, but that it could promote local hiring.
“Anything that continues to infuse new (oil and gas) production and therefore increases employment in the economy ... is very beneficial to an area, especially in Bakersfield,” spokeswoman Susanne Garfield said.
Sparano said the discovery could also benefit local government in that oil producers pay property taxes based on their proven petroleum reserves.
In addition, he said, the find could help reduce California’s dependence on foreign oil. Last year, he said, nearly half of the oil refined in the state was imported.
According to figures from the state Division of Oil, Gas & Geothermal Resources, the finding could rank among the top two dozen or so oil fields discovered in California.
The largest field in the state, Kern’s Midway-Sunset reserve, has produced about 3 billion barrels of oil since its discovery in 1894. The third-, fourth- and fifth-largest fields all are in Kern.
The division’s list of large oil reserves indicates that no major oil field has been discovered in the state since 1983.
