Baytex Energy Corp T.BTE

Venezuela

[Kelvin]

Yesterday 2 megaWatts of power went offline because of problems at Guri dam which supplies around 80% of Venezuela's electricity. Anyway we're on strict rationing, 5 hours of power, 5 hours blackout, nation wide. We're fine in our home because, months ago, we had installed a solar power system when I heard, through friends who are experts in power generation, that the turbines at Guri are in really bad shape.

Lets's see if oil prices increase because how is Venezuela gonna be able to export oil with unstable power supplies to run pumps at pumping stations and process equipment at oil processing plants? Maybe they have backup power. We'll see.

[red2000]

Hi Kelvin, Just to make a quick comparaison, here In Quebec, Canada, Hydro-Quebec produce 35,000 Mega Watts in peak period (winter). I think Venezuela oil producers need much more Megawatts just for here own production capacity. Of course, if there are more and more turbines at the end of their useful life... then it will be catastrophic for Venezuela. Thank's for the info.

[Kelvin]

You're welcome red2000. The local media reports that the turbines are Francis type reaction turbines made by Hitachi. The problem is that the US has sanctions on Venezuela so it may be a problem to fix the turbines. They're probably shunting power to the oil production facilities. Thousands of wells in Venezuela are in secondary production mode requiring pump jacks or downhole pumps which