Chevron lends $2 bn to Venezuelan joint venture

Funds will be used to hike production from 107,000 barrels a day today to 127,000 by 2019

US supermajor Chevron Corp. will provide $2 billion in financing to its Petroboscan joint venture with Venezuelan state-owned oil giant PDVSA under the terms of a new agreement, officials said.

Venezuelan Oil Minister and PDVSA CEO Rafael Ramirez and Chevron Africa and Latin America president Ali Moshiri signed the agreement Monday in Caracas.

The funds will be used by Petroboscan, which is located in western Venezuela, to increase production from 107,000 barrels per day (bpd) today to 127,000 bpd by 2019, Ramirez said in a press conference.

"We have an agreement that we have been working on for more than a year and it is for $2 billion in financing. It is a model that allows us to use these funds to increase production at our Boscan field," Ramirez said.

The loan will be disbursed in a series of tranches by San Ramon, California-based Chevron and used "immediately", Ramirez said.

The Boscan field, where Petroboscan operates, has reserves equivalent to 1.5 billion barrels of crude.

PDVSA's deal with Chevron follows the signing of agreements earlier this month with the Chinese government and Russian state-owned oil giant Rosneft.