Cuba Preparing for Offshore Oil Exploration
A year after the end of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, the worst oil spill in U.S. history, the Cuban government is set to dive into offshore oil exploration. Cuba currently produces little oil but the country believes that it has as much as 20 billion barrels of oil in offshore reserves. The U.S. Geological Survey however, suggests a more modest 4.6 billion barrels. If Cuba is right, the petroleum reserves would be enough to bolster its faltering economy and cut its dependence on oil imports from Venezuela.

A Spanish company by the name of Repsol will begin drilling the first exploratory well later this year or early in 2012. The well site is located 50 miles from the Florida Keys in Cuba‟s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and is in very deep water. Cuba‟s portion of the EEZ has been divided into 59 blocks, of which 22 have been leased to companies including Repsol, Malaysia‟s Petronas, Venezuela‟s PDVSA and PetroVietnam among others. A Chinese-built drilling rig, the Scarabeo 9 is expected to arrive in Cuban waters by late this summer or early fall, likely opening the way for full scale exploration of the island‟s offshore reserves. On the bright side, the Scarabeo 9 is a state-of-art semi-submersible rig built to the highest safety standards. Once the first well has been completed, the rig will be passed to other companies with contracts to drill in Cuban waters. Scientists warn that drilling in Cuban waters poses significant risks to the island, the United States and the northern islands of the Bahamas. And that a well blowout similar to the Deepwater Horizon Incident could send oil onto Cuban beaches and the Florida Keys within 3 days. Since many of the well sites are located in or near the Gulf Stream, oil would flow up towards south Florida and beyond potentially threatening Florida‟s coastline and its economy. A recent oil spill modeling study that examined a large well blowout occurring over a 2 month period showed the greatest potential impact to be the southeast coast of Florida and northern coast of Cuba. The study also predicted that the southeast coast of Florida has an 8% chance of being impacted with impacts occurring 5 days from the incident. Although the study included 200 separate scenarios and various wind conditions, it appears that it did not incorporate the formation of eddy currents that form from frictional forces of the Gulf Stream moving north and the long shore current moving south along the southeast Florida coastline. The formation of these circular eddy currents are believed to be a dominate force for moving oil toward the coastline. Therefore, when considering eddy current formation, the probability of impacts to the south Florida coastline is likely much higher in the order of 20%.

Additional U.S. concerns are the lack of oil spill preparedness in Cuba and the fact that U.S. companies (e.g., oil spill responders) cannot do business in Cuba because of the 1960 U.S. trade embargo unless specifically licensed by the State Department.