UPDATE 1-Petrobras geologist who led the pre-salt discovery to head division -sources

(New throughout, adds details and background)

By Sabrina Valle and Marta Nogueira

HOUSTON, Jan 27 (Reuters) – The new CEO of Brazil oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA has picked geologist Mario Carminatti to head the company’s exploration and production division, people with knowledge of the information said on Friday.

Carminatti led as chief geologist the discovery in 2006 of one of the world’s largest offsfhore oil deposits this century, the pre-salt. His name was chosen by newly appointed Chief Executive Jean Paul Prates, they said.

The board of directors of Petrobras, as the company is known, has yet to formally approve the composition of the new executive team, the people said.

Petrobras declined to comment. The people said the group includes Prates’ business partner Sergio Caetano Leite as chief financial officer, Mauricio Tolmasquim for chief energy transition officer and William Franca as refining head.

Prates sealed Carminatti’s choice in a meeting on Thursday at the Presidential Palace with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Chief of Staff Rui Costa and Workers Party leader Gleisi Hoffmann, one of the people said. Carminatti was not present.

NEW FRONTIER

Carminatti was ahead of Petrobras’s bold decision to drill past a thick layer of salt under the Atlantic seabed at the beginning of the millennium.

The salt barrier alone was more profound than any well that Petrobras, the world’s leader in deep-water exploration, had drilled before. It was about two kilometers deep, more than the company’s deepest well at 1,886 meters below water.

The multi-year geological program led to the largest crude discovery in that decade, in an offshore area that international oil producers had fruitlessly explored and then returned to Brazil’s oil regulator.

In 2008, the discovery was determined to have potential to hold more than 40 billion barrels of oil and gas, changing Lula’s second presidential term. The pre-salt area is now responsible for more than 70% of Brazil’s daily production of near 4 million barrels of oil and gas.

Carminatti is highly respected at Petrobras but has preferred to keep a low profile. Past CEOs have failed to convince him to take a post as head of a division in the company.

Carminatti is currently involved in an almost $3 billion exploration effort in a new frontier North of Brazil, the Equatorial Margin. Petrobras experts have compared the oil deposits in the region those of nearby Guyana. (Reporting by Sabrina Valle; Editing by Leslie Adler and David Gregorio)

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