CARACAS/HOUSTON — September 4, 2026 — Venezuela’s oil industry is entering a new phase of foreign investment after Chevron and Eni committed to major expansions, with the agreements signed in Caracas in the presence of Venezuela’s interim President Delcy Rodríguez and U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
Golden Page News | September 4, |2026
The deals mark a significant return of international capital to Venezuela’s battered oil sector, which currently produces about 1.25 million barrels per day, well below its peak of more than 3 million barrels per day in the late 1990s.
Chevron targets 600,000 barrels a day
Chevron said it will invest more than $7 billion over the next five years through its Venezuelan joint ventures, with the objective of more than doubling its production in the country to approximately 600,000 barrels per day
The U.S. oil major will expand its Petroindependencia joint venture to include two additional areas in Venezuela’s oil-rich Carabobo region of the Orinoco Belt.
Chevron said its new agreements provide improved fiscal, commercial and legal conditions intended to support long-term investment. The company expects total production costs to remain below $20 per barrel.
Chevron’s expansion is separate from a recently announced U.S.-Venezuela arrangement involving access to 17 oilfields, but it forms part of Washington’s broader push to increase Venezuelan production and attract private-sector investment.
Eni takes operatorship of giant Junín 5 field
Italy’s Eni is also moving deeper into Venezuela’s heavy-oil sector.
Eni and Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA signed a 25-year production-sharing contract under which Eni becomes the exclusive operator of the Junín 5 field in the Orinoco Belt, assuming responsibility for its technical, financial and commercial management. (Eni)
Reuters reported that Eni plans to invest approximately $1.5 billion in Junín 5. The field currently produces around 12,000 barrels per day, while Eni has set a broader target of reaching 400,000 barrels per day from its Venezuelan oil projects by the end of the decade.
Eni says Junín 5 contains 35 billion barrels of certified oil in place, underscoring the scale of the resource even though significant investment and development will be required to increase production. (Eni)
Eni’s wider Venezuelan portfolio also includes the Perla natural-gas project through Cardón IV and the Corocoro offshore oil field. The company has operated in Venezuela since 1998.
Washington’s role
The new investment agreements come amid an extraordinary shift in U.S.-Venezuelan energy relations.
The Trump administration is backing a broader $100 billion investment strategy intended to rebuild Venezuela’s energy infrastructure and potentially double the country’s oil production. U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright attended the September 2 signing ceremony in Caracas and described the administration’s approach as moving at what he called “Trump-speed.”
The U.S. Department of Energy said the September 2 agreements with Chevron, Eni and GE Vernova are intended to expand oil production, unlock private investment and modernize Venezuela’s electricity system. (The Department of Energy’s Energy.gov)
The moves follow a separate Caracas-Washington agreement involving 17 oilfields and roughly a fifth of Venezuela’s oil reserves, a development that has generated political controversy and questions over the country’s future energy governance.
Political and investment risks remain
Despite the influx of capital commitments, Venezuela’s investment environment remains politically sensitive.
Opposition leader María Corina Machado said Thursday that long-term investors require a stable and legitimate government to provide the certainty and security needed for major projects. She also questioned aspects of the separate U.S.-Venezuela oil arrangement.
The challenge facing the new projects is substantial. Venezuela possesses the world’s largest proven oil reserves, but years of underinvestment, operational deterioration, mismanagement and U.S. sanctions have sharply reduced production capacity.
For Chevron and Eni, however, the latest agreements represent a bet that Venezuela’s enormous resource base, existing infrastructure and newly revised investment rules can make large-scale oil development commercially viable again.
If the projects meet their targets, they could substantially reshape Venezuela’s oil output — and strengthen the country’s importance to the global oil market at a time when Washington is seeking additional supplies and greater influence over international energy flows.
