By Brazil Stock Guide – Petrobras’ Búzios field in Brazil’s pre-salt Santos Basin reached average daily production of 1.1 million barrels of oil on Tuesday, surpassing the 1 million-barrel mark recorded in October 2025 and reinforcing the asset’s central role in the company’s upstream portfolio.
The state-controlled producer, which trades in New York under the ticker PBR and in São Paulo under PETR3 and PETR4, said Búzios is now responsible for about one-third of all oil output operated by the company in Brazil, including partner volumes.
Measured only by Petrobras’ working-interest share, Búzios accounts for almost half of the company’s production. The field is Brazil’s largest both by output and reserves, making it one of Petrobras’ most important growth engines as the company continues to expand offshore production in the pre-salt layer.
“This record marks an important phase of production acceleration at Búzios, which will grow even more. We continue connecting new wells and increasing production at the P-78 and P-79 platforms. Búzios is Petrobras’ most promising field and will break record after record,” Petrobras Chief Executive Officer Magda Chambriard said.
Búzios currently produces through eight units: P-74, P-75, P-76, P-77, P-78, P-79 and the FPSOs Almirante Barroso and Almirante Tamandaré. The latter is Brazil’s largest production unit by capacity, with the ability to process 270,000 barrels a day.
The P-78 and P-79 platforms, the most recent units deployed to the field, are undergoing ramp-up toward their maximum production capacity of 180,000 barrels of oil a day each.
Petrobras expects Búzios to eventually operate with 12 FPSOs. The P-80, P-82 and P-83 units are still under construction, while the Búzios 12 unit is in the bidding phase.
Renata Baruzzi, Petrobras’ director of engineering, technology and innovation, said the company has been able to accelerate production through project-management, engineering and technology measures.
“We have managed to accelerate production at Búzios and contribute to records like this through management strategies, engineering and innovative technologies, which allow us to bring forward the departure of units from shipyards and their earlier arrival at the field, which is also prepared in advance to receive them,” Baruzzi said.
The field’s performance is also linked to its geological characteristics. Petrobras said Búzios has the most productive wells in Brazil, located more than 2,000 meters below the seabed. The reservoir’s thickness is comparable to the height of Rio de Janeiro’s Sugarloaf Mountain, while its extension is more than twice the size of Guanabara Bay.
“The Búzios wells have very high productivity due to the quality of the reservoir rock and its great thickness. It is a rock with high permo-porosity and oil with a high API gravity, which favors a strong flow of oil from the rock to the well,” said Sylvia Anjos, Petrobras’ director of exploration and production.
Permo-porosity refers to the combination of porosity and permeability, properties associated with the capacity of rock or soil to store and transmit fluids such as oil or gas.
Búzios is the second Petrobras field to exceed production of 1 million barrels a day. The first was Tupi, also located in the pre-salt Santos Basin.
The Búzios consortium is operated by Petrobras and includes Chinese partners CNOOC Ltd., listed in Hong Kong as 00883 and in Shanghai as 600938, CNODC, and PPSA, the Brazilian state company responsible for managing production-sharing contracts.