Mexico cuts 2009 oil output goal by 100,000 bpd

[phantom power]

The soft bigotry of lowered expectations...

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's state oil monopoly Pemex said on Thursday it cut its 2009 output goal to 2.65 million barrels per day, underscoring its struggle to replace capacity lost at the aging Cantarell field.

Pemex had previously said output would end the year around 2.75 million bpd but the slide in yields at Cantarell, once one of the world's most prolific oil fields, and delays in starting up new wells at its unconventional Chicontepec project rendered this goal unattainable.

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssEnergyNews/idUSN3035520620090730

Last year, Pemex’s output fell at the fastest rate since World War II, costing it more than $20 billion in potential sales amid record crude prices. Pemex cut its forecast three times last year as its then-largest field, Cantarell, dropped more than twice as fast as government predictions.

“It is an uphill battle to surpass the natural decline in Cantarell,” Gianna Bern, president of Brookshire Advisory and Research Inc., said in an interview yesterday from Flossmoor, Illinois. “Given bureaucratic delays, it could impede efforts to increase production. It is not very likely.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601072&sid=aPKO1WpS8h3o