Uploaded on 2019-04-04 by ANDRES CARRERO

A WORLD OIL POWER The proven reserves of hydrocarbons in Venezuela currently reach 298.3 billion barrels of oil and 197.06 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. These figures, recently certified, make Venezuela the country with the largest oil reserves in the world, surpassing Saudi Arabia; and in the eighth as regards natural gas. It must be considered, however, that 75% of these reserves are extra-heavy crude, that is: oil that is difficult and expensive to extract, difficult to transport, and complicated to refine. This circumstance, relativizes somewhat the positioning of Venezuela in the international trade of hydrocarbons because light oil, like that of Saudi Arabia, is the most required and enjoys better prices in the world In fact, the trends expressed in the Graph show that the incidence of hydroelectricity, since the 70s, has risen much more than that of oil and natural gas.