Brazil's Sergipe block has high-quality crude - Petrobras

SAO PAULO (Reuters) - The oil field off Brazil's northeast coast by Petróleo Brasileiro SA and partner India's Bharat Petroleum Corp is excellent and contains high-quality crude, Brazil's state-controlled oil company said on Thursday.

Petrobras, as the company is known, and a unit of its joint venture partner concluded a drilling test in the 3-BRSA-1178D-SES (3-SES-176D) well, known as Farfan 1, to evaluate the well's productivity, a securities filing said. The area is located about 100 kilometers (62.5 miles) north of Aracajú, the capital of the Brazilian northeastern state of Sergipe.

The test found high-quality oil with a density of 38 degrees API in a reservoir presenting "good conditions and excellent productivity readings," the filing added.

Reuters reported on September 26 that the discovery, centered on the SEAL-11 offshore exploration block, likely holds more than 1 billion barrels of oil and that the region will soon become Brazil's biggest new oil frontier.

Petrobras Chief Executive Officer Maria das Graças Foster said earlier this month that the block could produce a minimum 100,000 barrels of petroleum a day starting in 2018.

The SEAL-11 block is 60 percent-owned by Petrobras and 40 percent-owned by IBV Brasil, a 50-50 joint venture between Bharat and Videocon Industries Ltd .

(Reporting by Guillermo Parra-Bernal; Editing by Bob Burgdorfer)