Brazil could be an energy trailblazer

The oil powerhouse will not just join the top five crude exporters in the coming years, it may be a model for how petrostates balance growth, policy and sustainability

Brazil was considered a marginal oil producer only two decades ago. However, thanks to its vast offshore resources, NOC Petrobras’ deepwater expertise and institutional reforms in the late 1990s, it was propelled into the ranks of leading global suppliers. Today, the country is the largest Latin American producer but remains at a crossroads between expanding its oil and gas dominance and balancing it with the imperatives of the energy transition. As with most oil and gas companies in Latin America, Brazil’s oil history started with a nationalist vision. Petrobras was founded in 1953 under President Getulio Vargas as a monopoly to enhance the country’s economic sovereignty and had the slogan