Haiti could have
larger oil reserves than Venezuela 1/28/10
Amidst the utter devastation left in the wake of the earthquake that
rocked Haiti on January 12th, new findings indicate the existence of 3
million barrels of oil in a shallow formation offshore the
island.
The Greater Antilles, which includes Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican
Republic, Puerto Rico and their offshore waters, probably hold at least
142 million barrels of oil and 159 billion cubic feet of gas, according
to a 2000 report by the US Geological Survey. Undiscovered amounts may
be as high as 941 million barrels of oil and 1.2 trillion cubic feet of
gas, according to the report.
Among nations in the northern Caribbean, Cuba and Jamaica have awarded
offshore leases for oil and gas development. Trinidad & Tobago,
South American islands off the coast of Venezuela, account for most
Caribbean oil production, according to the US Energy
Department.
According to French scientist Daniel Mathurin, “The Central Plateau,
including the region of Thomond, the plain of the cul-de-sac and the
bay of Port-au-Prince are filled with oil”. He added that “Haiti's oil
reserves are larger than those of Venezuela . An Olympic pool compared
to a glass of water that is the comparison to show the importance of
oil Haitian compared to those of Venezuela.”
Mathurin also stated that “We have identified 20 sites Oil…5 of them
are considered very important by practitioners and
policies.”
President Hugo Chavez recently announced that he would write off the
undisclosed sum Haiti owes Venezuela for oil as part of the ALBA bloc’s
plans to help the impoverished Caribbean nation after the devastating
January 12 earthquake.
“Haiti has no debt with Venezuela, just the opposite: Venezuela has a
historical debt with that nation, with that people for whom we feel not
pity but rather admiration, and we share their faith, their hope,”
Chavez said after the extraordinary meeting of foreign ministers of the
Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas, or ALBA.
He also announced that ALBA has decided on a comprehensive plan that
includes an immediate donation of $20 million to Haiti’s health sector,
and a fund that, Chavez said, will be at least $100 million ‘for
starters.’
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IV.
MISCELLANEOUS SCIENTIFIC INTELLIGENCE.
1.
On the occurrence of Petroleum
in the island of Santo Domingo; by W. M. GABB (Editorial
correspondence,
dated Santo Domingo, April 20, 1872.
-We must add to the known localities of
bituminous products
in tile West Indies a single locality; the Dominican Republic.
This
is a spot about three miles north of the town of Azua, on a stream
called
"el Agua hediondo," or stinking water.
The
spot reminded me strikingly of the California petroleum
springs, not less in the existence of oil, pitch, and gas, than in the
usual broken-down steam engine and fragments of artesian well tools
lying
scattered around.
The
spring makes its appearance as a stagnant, torpid
pool, exuding slowly through a heavy gravel deposit. Deposits of
pitch cover a very small area in the vicinity; for half a mile down the
now dry bed of a rainwater stream, an impure pitch, sometimes plastic,
oftener hardened to asphaltum, as the case may be, cements the gravel
or
sand.
The
pools of the spring and neighboring excavations contain
a dirty water rendered brown by contact with the oil, and on the
surface
is a thin pellicle of liquid petroleum, dark brownish-green to
reflected
light, and reddish brown by transmitted light.
On
rubbing a drop in the palm of the it does not disappear
as readily as the oil of California and the odor is not so much like
kerosene,
but rather fetid.
-An
attempt was made during the " oil excitement" of 1865
or 1866 to bore here. The usual tools taken to the spot and
eventually
abandoned. In the piece of pipe yet remains a small accumulation
of oil, through which bubbles up a gas. It is inodorous and is
not
inflammable. At the distance of a few yards is a depression where
there are several gas jets, and where, over the whole area, there is
not
a single blade of grass or any other vegetation.
I
consider this locality especially interesting because
it is the only spot in the whole Republic of Santo Domingo where
bituminous
products are found, and because of its resemblance in so many respects
to the localities I have seen in California. It also agrees with
the springs of Trinidad in its appearance and mode of occurrence.
See the report of the Colonial Geologists, London, 1860, pp, 134 et.
seq.
See also Schomburgh, Hist. Of Barbados, pp. 553 and 569.
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