Bolivian protests cut natural gas exports

Thu Sep 11, 2008 6:45pm EDT
By Carlos Quiroga
LA PAZ (Reuters) - Bolivia cut natural gas exports to Argentina and halved its shipments of the fuel to Brazil on Thursday after anti-government protesters damaged one pipeline and stormed a control station on another line, energy officials said.
Brazil, which is Bolivia's biggest foreign energy investor and relies on its neighbor for about half its natural gas needs, said it would take emergency measures to deal with the supply shortage.
"Overnight a security valve ... was manipulated, generating the total interruption of service through the GASYRG (pipeline)," said pipeline operator Transierra, which is owned by Brazil's state-run oil company Petrobras, France's Total, Spain's Repsol, and Bolivian state oil company YPFB.
That pipeline usually sends some 17 million cubic meters a day of natural gas to Brazil. Bolivia's total daily exports to its large neighbor are between 30 million and 31 million cubic meters a day -- far more than it sends to Argentina, its second-biggest buyer.
However, an YPFB spokesman said all supplies to Argentina have been suspended at midday, a reduction of at least 1 million cubic meters per day.
The spokesman said staff had closed the valves "for security reasons" after demonstrators opposed to leftist President Evo Morales occupied a pipeline control station in the city of Yacuiba, which lies close to the Argentine border.
TASK FORCE
Brazilian Energy and Mines Minister Edson Lobao called a task force to study the situation. Lobao has said the country could ration gas consumption, feed thermoelectric plants with fuel oil instead of gas, or tap the gas that Petrobras re-injects into oil wells.
Two Brazilian government sources told Reuters they expected the natural gas flow to get back to normal later on Thursday.
Before being totally halted on Thursday, the exports through the GASYRG pipeline to Brazil were cut on Wednesday from 17 million cubic meters to 14 million cubic meters, due to a fire farther up the pipeline that was set off by damages caused by anti-government protesters.
"As of early this morning the area was still burning, so we could not access it to evaluate possible damages," Transierra said in a statement.
Bolivia's rightist opposition has intensified anti-government protests in eastern Bolivia in recent days, demanding a bigger share of energy resources for their regions and more autonomy from the central government.
Government officials have called the attacks on the pipeline "terrorist attacks," and vowed to step up security to avoid further supply cuts.
"They're reinforcing the militarization of the oil fields and in all areas that are most susceptible to terrorist acts," Bolivian Finance Minister Luis Arce told reporters in Brasilia.
(Additional reporting by Denise Luna in Brazil; Editing by Helen Popper and Lisa Shumaker)