Within seven years, in 2031, Argentina could have energy exports worth about 30 billion dollars annually
, a foreign exchange income that would remain constant for about 20 years,
calculated the president of YPF, Horacio Marín, for a presentation in Expoagro
.
In that case, the sector's trade balance would be positive by more than US$25 billion;
the equivalent of
half of the debt with the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
or just under 25% of the capital restructured in the middle of the pandemic with private investment funds.
In this way, the
"Dead Cow" would be on par with the "live cow" that is the countryside and the country's economy would stop depending on the weather
, rain or drought to add activity, accumulate reserves, tax revenues. and, the ultimate goal,
lower inflation, unemployment and poverty
.
Argentina would thus become a true
energy power
in a world that will continue in the coming years the long transition from coal and the most polluting fossils to renewable energies.
For this, Marín designed an intermediate plan that he named "4x4" and consists of
quadrupling the value of the share in four years
, based on different measures that will enhance
investments in Vaca Muerta
and develop the
infrastructure of oil and gas pipelines
to evacuate production. towards countries in the region and towards the sea.
YPF's 4x4 plan
The 4 pillars of the plan are: the focus on Vaca Muerta, the formation of unconventional oil and gas (
shale
and
tight
) that has reserves equivalent to the energy consumption of Argentina for 200 years;
the sale of 55 mature fields to other smaller oil companies, as well as the divestment of stakes in different companies;
the efficiency and productivity of its fields and refineries;
and the mega project for the
production of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) together with Petronas
, the Malaysian state company, which would also cover the rest of the large oil companies that operate in the country and extract gas, such as
Total Austral, PAE, Tecpetrol, Pampa Energía, Pluspetrol and CGC
.
According to data from the province of
Neuquén
published by the
+e portal of La Mañana de Neuquén
,
in 2024 oil investments in that region of the country will total about US$9,050 million
, of which YPF would allocate a little less than half, about US$ 4.3 billion;
At the same time, the state company plans to drill 222 wells out of 445 in total.
Argentina today has a production of 686,300 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil, of which 345,300 bpd are "unconventional" from Vaca Muerta.
The figure could reach one
million barrels per day of shale in 2030
, which requires large capital outlays in infrastructure.
In that sense, YPF is leading the construction of the
Vaca Muerta Sur Pipeline
, which will go from Allen (Neuquén) to a deep-water port in Punta Colorada (Río Negro), which would be another major energy export hub starting in 2026.
The oil company hired another former Techint for this purpose: Gustavo Gallino, one of the heads of the President Néstor Kirchner Gas Pipeline (GPNK) - he was General Director of the Southern Area of Techint Engineering and Construction -, which was carried out in less than a year.
"
In 2026 there will be no more bottlenecks in oil transportation
, between the Vaca Muerta Sur Pipeline, the Trasandino Pipeline (Otasa) for crude oil exports to Chile and the expansions of Oleoductos del Valle (Oldelval)," he assured. Marin.
Former professional tennis player (in the ATP records it appears that he lost the only match he played, in the Brasilia tournament in 1981) and fan of the sport where Guillermo Vilas shone, the president and CEO of YPF considers that
the oil company should be the " Novak Djokovic" of energy
: play only large tournaments such as the Grand Slam and the Masters 1000, which in this sense would be Vaca Muerta, offshore and liquefied gas, and relegate minor tournaments such as the ATP 250. These competitions, taken to the energy level, are the fields it has in
Mendoza, Chubut and Santa Cruz
, where the company's exit by selling its assets is problematic but - they recognize in the sector - also necessary.
With "
process management
", Marín wants to make the firm more productive, reduce downtime and in net terms each employee almost doubles the effective working hours.
And finally,
the long-term objective
is to achieve the production of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to achieve large-scale exports.
Company executives think that in Argentina it is only viable
if the entire industry is integrated into the same project,
which is advanced with Petronas.
The goal is to begin converting with a liquefier ship the equivalent of about 6 million m3 per day (MMm3/d) of natural gas into LNG by 2027 only with YPF, to add to the entire industry with about 40 MMm3/d between 2029 and 2030 and launch an onshore (continental) plant that doubles capacity in the following years.
For this, investments of about US$ 16,000 million
annually would be needed
, between the construction of the liquefaction plant (a process by which natural gas at 15° is cooled to -161° to compress its volume by 600 times and facilitate its transport by ships) and the laying of three gas pipelines "dedicated" exclusively to this project.
NE