Brazil's oil imports continue to grow

Four years ago, Brazil discovered a huge amount of deep-sea oil reserves. The prediction that Brazil was about to become an important fuel exporter in Latin America was once awkward. Four years later, things were going in the opposite direction. The rapidly growing economy and soaring demand for fossil fuels have turned Brazil into a net oil importer. Gasoline imports that were occasionally made last year have now become the norm.

Roberto Costa, president of Petrobras, said recently that four to five years ago, everyone was discussing how to increase Brazilian oil exports, but since 2010, the rules of the game have completely changed. "The growth in fuel demand has begun to exceed GDP growth, and Brazil has become a crude oil importer." Costa said that this year, Brazil's national oil will continue to rely on foreign fuel suppliers.

Earlier, Brazil’s national oil company had announced that by the end of August, Brazil would import 3.2 million barrels of crude oil, equivalent to the total amount of imports last year. Reuters reported that Brazil is repeating the old path that must be adopted by emerging economies. With the rapid economic growth, energy demand has exploded. At present, ethanol fuel supplies nearly half of Brazil's vehicles, but in the short term, there is no sign of a second outbreak of sugar cane ethanol industry in Brazil. However, the cost of deep sea oil development is too high, which has led Brazil to gradually become another world energy consumption center market. .

Reuters believes that the situation of Brazilian oil net imports may last for 10 years.

Market analysts pointed out that as Brazil’s national oil company decided to prioritize the use of funds and manpower for upstream oil and gas exploration and development, it suspended the construction of downstream projects, and in particular delayed the construction of a number of refineries, including a daily refining capacity of 300,000. The barrels of high-capacity refineries are expected to continue to experience tight supply in Brazil in the next five years. It is reported that before the Brazilian Petronas proposed to build 4 new refineries to meet their fuel needs, including the first refinery plans to start production in early 2013. However, Brazil expects that even if all four refineries go online as scheduled, they still need to be partially imported to fully meet domestic demand.

The current US-European debt crisis has slowed the pace of global economic recovery and Brazil will also be affected to some extent. However, the industry generally believes that although Brazil's fuel demand growth may slow down, the overall trend is still rising.

The highly developed ethanol fuel industry is a proud energy achievement in Brazil, and most Brazilian cars can burn this biofuel. Statistics show that about 90% of the cars sold in Brazil last year were able to use ethanol fuel, but it seems difficult to become a savior for Brazil.

Since last year, international sugar prices have risen by 85%, and most fuel producers have therefore abandoned processing of sugarcane ethanol, which has caused the price of gasoline in Brazil to rise. At the same time, after the outbreak of the financial crisis in 2008, most small-scale ethanol producers have not yet fully recovered, which further deepens the haze of the ethanol fuel industry in Brazil. The Brazilian sugar consulting company Datagro** Nastari believes that it will take at least three to four years for the Brazilian sugarcane ethanol industry to fully resume production.