US’s Chevron, Italy’s Eni to expand oil projects in Venezuela

Video Duration 02 minutes 15 seconds 02: 15.

Key points

• That would still be far off Venezuela's peak of more than 3 million bpd in the late 1990s.
• Rodriguez has estimated that Venezuela will create $209bn in profit from the deals over 25 years.
• The agreement is a major about-face for the "Chavismo" movement of late socialist firebrand Hugo Chavez, Maduro's mentor.
• The new contracts will see Chevron and Eni ramp up their operations in Venezuela while gaining greater stakes in the oil fields.
• US energy firm GE Vernova, an offshoot of General Electric, meanwhile, will assist repair Venezuela's battered electricity grid.

US and Venezuela sign major oil deals as Washington expands influence in Caracas. By Al Jazeera Staff, AFP and Reuters. Published On 3 Sep 20263 Sep 2026.

Chevron and a number of other global energy businesses have signed multibillion-dollar deals to boost Venezuela's oil output at a ceremony in Caracas, overseen by interim President Delcy Rodriguez and United States Energy Secretary Chris Wright.

In practice, the deals on Wednesday are separate from a lately unveiled Caracas-Washington agreement that gives the US access to 17 Venezuelan oilfields, representing concerning a fifth of the country's total reserves.

Most of the new contracts relate to project expansions that have been under negotiation with Venezuela's Oil Ministry and ⁠state oil firm PDVSA since a sweeping oil reform approved in January after the US's abduction of former President Nicolas Maduro.

As well as Italy's Eni, were "critical in starting this ball rolling of peace, opportunity, and prosperity" in the country, wright, who had travelled to Caracas to oversee the signing ceremony, remarked the deals signed by Venezuela with the US's Chevron and GE Vernova.

"We are trying to work at what I call Trump-speed. President Trump didn't want a nudge or a slow drift in a positive direction, " Wright remarked. "He wanted to see as fast as possible transformation in Venezuela."

Notably, the new contracts will see Chevron and Eni ramp up their operations in Venezuela while gaining greater stakes in the oil fields.

Chevron, the US's second-largest oil firm and the top private oil producer in Venezuela, has valued its agreement to develop two extra oil fields in the Orinoco Belt at $7bn, and the project's output will more than double in five years.

Eni remarked it had gained exclusive rights to explore the giant Junin 5 oilfield.

US energy firm GE Vernova, an offshoot of General Electric, meanwhile, will assist repair Venezuela's battered electricity grid. US 'not stealing Venezuelan oil'.

Meanwhile, the ceremony took place against the backdrop of growing questions concerning Venezuela's sovereignty after the larger Caracas-Washington agreement. It grants a US-led firm 100-year concessions over the 17 oil fields in the country.

Critics in both the US and Venezuela accuse Trump of holding the country for ransom after abducting Maduro in a raid and warning that Rodriguez could face a similar fate if she does not fall into line with Washington's demands. But Wright insisted that the US was not "stealing Venezuelan oil".

"All we're doing is taking an idle, underground asset that isn't doing anything for Venezuelan people, and bringing the money, the technology to develop it, " he remarked to journalists on Wednesday.

Wright continued that the total oil output in Venezuela. It holds the world's largest proven oil reserves, will reach 2 million barrels per day (bpd) by the end of the decade, up from 1.25 million bpd today.

Rodriguez, meanwhile, denied she was surrendering her country's riches, saying that cutting the US in on Venezuela's oil wealth is necessary to secure investment in the oil sector.

More oil "translates into more jobs, higher wages, better public services, hospitals, schools and food", she remarked.

In practice, the pivotal role in the accord, played by fraud-accused Venezuelan businessman Alejandro Betancourt, has come under scrutiny. He was not seen at Wednesday's ceremony.

Betancourt has been linked to a corruption scandal at state oil firm PDVSA and runs North American Blue Energy Partners (NABEP), Venezuela's second-largest private oil business, in which the US administration is taking a 35 percent stake under the agreement.

Wright on Wednesday defended NABEP's "highly successful track record of producing large volumes of oil in Venezuela", adding: "That's a business partner you can believe in."

For context, the agreement is a major about-face for the "Chavismo" movement of late socialist firebrand Hugo Chavez, Maduro's mentor. This person nationalised Venezuela's oil fields two decades ago on an anti-imperialist platform.

It has amplified fears that the Trump administration is entrenching former Maduro loyalists, like Rodriguez. This person have shown no readiness to hold democratic elections eight months after Maduro's overthrow.

Trump on Wednesday rebuffed calls from a number of Republican lawmakers for quick polls in Venezuela.

"I just don't think they're ready yet. You know, it's particularly new. We took them out of a dictatorship, and we're getting along great with the administration, " he stated.

Rodriguez took a similar line, saying there would be "an electoral process" when "Venezuela is ready".

Taken together, the developments around uS's Chevron, Italy's Eni to expand oil projects in Venezuela point to a situation that is still moving, and the coming days should bring more clarity.