Petrobras Discovers World's Third-Largest Oil Field

Petroleo Brasileiro SA's offshore Carioca prospect may hold 33 billion barrels of oil, enough to supply every refinery in the U.S. for six years, making it the third-largest oil field ever discovered.

Additional wells must be drilled to develop a "more conclusive'' estimate, the Rio de Janeiro-based company said. Only Saudi Arabia's Ghawar and Kuwait's Burgan fields are bigger: Ghawar holds as much as 83 billion barrels of crude, while Burgan has up to 72 billion. Petrobras, as the company is known, rose almost 6 percent. The whole area off the coast of Brazil is becoming a new oil province. The Carioca field, also known as BM-S-9, is located beneath a layer of salt in the deepwater Santos Basin off Brazil's southeastern coast, where Petrobras in November announced the discovery of the 8 billion-barrel Tupi field. It is part of a major transformation of Petrobras, which could lead to it becoming a much larger company in terms of production and reserves over the next 5-10 years. The field is 45 percent-controlled by Petrobras.

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