Thanks for that WT. Curiousity Satisfied.

Cantarell's output dropped by more than 540,000 barrels a day in May from a year earlier as the deposit lost pressure, making it more difficult and expensive to extract crude. Pemex has been injecting nitrogen for more than 10 years to stimulate production.

The development peaked at 65 percent of the company's 3.3 million barrels of daily
crude output in 2003. In May, it fell to 37 percent of total production.

The world's largest oil field is Ghawar in Saudi Arabia, followed by Burgan in Kuwait and Cantarell.

From Bloomberg today per Leanan.

From:

Cantarell, The Third Largest Oil Field in the World Is Dying
Copyright 2004, 2007 G.R. Morton This can be freely distributed so long as no changes are made and no charges are made.

http://home.entouch.net/dmd/cantarell.htm

In 1995 it was producing 1 million barrels per day and the Mexican government decided to invest in that field to raise the production level. They built 26 new platforms, drilled lots of new wells and built the largest nitrogen extraction facility capable of injecting a billion cubic feet of nitrogen per day to maintain reservoir pressure. Doing this raised the oil production rate in 2001 to 2.2 million barrels per day. Today the field produces 2.1 million barrels.

To put this amount of production into perspectives, the largest field discovered in the US Gulf of Mexico will produce about 250,000 barrels per day. That field has about a billion barrels of reserves. If I were to find a field of that size, the company I worked for would probably make me president.

A couple of weeks ago I ran into this from the oil industry rags I read. It is a chilling thought since this is the 2nd biggest producer of oil on earth. Ghawar produces 4.5 million bbl/day, Cantarell, 2.2 million bbl/day, Da Qing and Burgun around 1 million per day.

"Supergiant Cantarell continues to be the mainstay of Mexican oil production, with 2.1 MMb/d of output in 2003 up from 1.9 MMb/d in 2002. However, Cantarell is expected to decline rapidly over the next few years, falling as far as 1 MM b/d by 2008. This has given particular urgency to Pemex's efforts to develop other fields and move into deepwater." For now, Pemex's best alternative project is the heavy-oil complex known as Ku-Maloob-Zaap, in Campeche Bay close to Cantarell. Output from this complex was 288,000 b/d in 2003 and is expected to rise to about 800,000 b/d by the end of the decade." David Shields, "Pemex Ready to Drill in Deepwater Perdido Area," Offshore, June 2004, p. 38

Pretty damn accurate.

Mexico's Cantarell Dec oil output hits 2007 low | Markets | Reuters
MEXICO CITY, Jan 26, 2008 (Reuters) - Crude oil output from Mexico's huge but aging Cantarell offshore field fell to 1.260 million barrels per day in December, ...

uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKN2638783120080126

MEXICO CITY, June 26, 2007 (Reuters) -
May oil output slips at Mexico's Cantarell field
Jun 26, 2007 ... Cantarell, closely watched by the oil industry after sharp dips in output, produced an average of 1.579 million barrels per day (May) versus 1.592 (April).

www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN2636032620070626

Basically all of Cantarell is going to the US now.

I guess you must be wondering how Pemex is ever going to be able to fulfil its contracts to Shell's Deer Park and Valero's Port Arthur refineries.

Pemex Cuts Crude Supply to Shell, Valero Refineries in Texas

July 7 (Bloomberg) -- Petroleos Mexicanos, Mexico's state- owned oil company, reduced the amount of crude oil it supplies to Texas refineries operated by Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Valero Energy Corp. as falling production curbs exports.

The guaranteed amount of Mayan oil for a Deer Park, Texas, refinery jointly operated with Shell, Europe's biggest oil company, was cut by 15 percent, the Mexico City-based company said in a regulatory filing. Pemex also lowered oil supplies by 5.8 percent to the Port Arthur, Texas, refinery of Valero, the largest U.S. refiner.
[...]
The revised Shell accord guarantees 170,000 barrels a day of Maya from May until 2023, Pemex said in the filing. Pemex provided Deer Park 200,000 barrels a day since April 2001.
[...]
Pemex also reduced the supply to Valero's Port Arthur refinery to 177,000 barrels a day in May from 188,000 barrels under a previous contract.

Bloomberg