Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has announced a resumption of oil and gas drilling in the western Amazon basin, ending a near-ten-year halt on new exploration in one of the world's most ecologically sensitive regions. The announcement was made at a ceremony in the northern state of Amazonas, where Lula was joined by Petrobras chief executive Magda Chambriard.
State oil company Petrobras will invest 2.5 billion reais — approximately 430 million US dollars — to drill 22 new wells at the Urucu oil field, located deep within the Amazon rainforest, where extraction first began some four decades ago. Urucu is Brazil's largest onshore oil reserve and currently accounts for around eight percent of the country's national gas production in 2025. The site is considered strategically important for energy supply to Brazil's comparatively poor northern region.
Lula, a left-wing president, defended the decision by framing fossil fuel revenues as essential to financing Brazil's broader energy transition. "We love Brazil, we love Petrobras, we want to live well, work well and study well — and that is only possible with economic growth," he said at the ceremony. Brazil was the world's ninth-largest oil producer last year, and roughly 95 percent of its output comes from offshore platforms. Lula also backs a major offshore drilling project near the mouth of the Amazon river.
The announcement has drawn sharp criticism from climate and environmental campaigners, who warn that expanded drilling risks irreversible damage to the world's largest tropical rainforest. The tension is particularly striking given that Brazil hosted the UN climate conference COP30 in the Amazonian city of Belém, where Lula called on world leaders to produce a roadmap for phasing out fossil fuels — even as his own government has yet to submit its national plan for doing so, despite having committed to publishing one by February.
The contradictions embedded in Brazil's energy policy reflect a dilemma shared by many resource-rich developing nations: how to fund social development and a green transition while remaining dependent on the very revenues that fuel the climate crisis. For Lula, who is seeking re-election in October at the age of 80, the economic case for Urucu appears, for now, to outweigh the environmental cost.