BHP Billiton close to drilling first oil wells in Mexico’s deep waters.

The Australian mining giant, which last year won rights to partner with state-owned Pemex in the Gulf of Mexico’s Trion field, hopes to have a drilling rig contracted this year and to spud two wells in the second half of 2018, Steve Pastor, BHP’s petroleum president, said Monday in an interview in Mexico City. Trion, which Pemex estimates to hold the equivalent of 485 million barrels of crude, could become one of the Gulf’s largest oil-producing areas, he said.

Source: Bloomberg