This is blocking the Orinoco river's navigation canal, causing problems for industry further upstream.
LUKoil and Gazprom are increasingly replacing American oil companies in the exploitation of the Orinoco Basin.
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The government's main hope of boosting output lies in the Orinoco heavy-oil belt.
In 1899, the border dispute between British Guiana and Venezuela was finally settled, Venezuela gaining the area around the mouth of the Orinoco river.
Second both companies are considering the possibility of an oil pipeline from the vast oil resources of the Orinoco to the Colombian Pacific coast to export oil to China.
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TNK-BP is also part of a consortium of five Russian companies that is partnering with PdVSA to develop the Junin 6 oil field, which is also in the Orinoco belt.
In addition to its massive proved reserves, it has an estimated 260 billion barrels of heavy crude--roughly equal to Saudi reserves--in its Orinoco Belt stretching across the center of the nation.
St Mary's all-weather lifeboat travelled the furthest distance in a single shout, when it was launched to rescue the catamaran Orinoco Flo 85 miles (137km) off the Isles of Scilly.
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In 2008 it signed a deal with PdVSA to jointly study a block in the Orinoco heavy crude belt, which the government in Caracas says holds the largest hydrocarbon reserves in the world.
In addition to its massive proved reserves, it has an estimated 260 billion barrels of heavy crude--roughly equal to the Saudi reserves--in the Orinoco Belt that stretches across the center of the nation.
PDVSA, the national oil company, has taken over the fields in the Orinoco belt where many of the reserves are located, pushing out the likes of Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips.
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Mr. Chavez has already colluded with other OPEC nations to raise oil prices, and if he's successful in nationalizing multibillion-dollar crude projects in the Orinoco Belt, there's a risk that prices could jump again.
The system utilizes equipment from Proxim Wireless -- namely the company's 100 ORiNOCO AP-4000MR mesh access points -- and adding CCTV video surveillance cams, VoIP channels, and GPS capabilities are all in the cards.
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The Argentinean steel producer Siderurgica del Orinoco is pressured to satisfy domestic demand, whereas foreign banks like Banco Hispano de Santander (Spain) are pushed to roll over the internal debt and lend cheaply to the domestic sector.
While a lot of attention has been paid on wireless networking in recent months--Apple Airport and Lucent Technologies ' (nyse: LU - news - people) Orinoco products come to mind--some of the products have been criticized for being difficult for the average home users to set up.
Now, there are businesses that look like regular business and factories such as tuna and tractor factories that look like regular factories, all of them located in sensitive areas near the Orinoco River (an important connection between Colombia and Venezuela) in Venezuela with access to the Caribbean and to the Atlantic Ocean.
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Just days earlier the president had taken a similar decision in relation to the cement industry: three foreign transnationals Mexico's Cemex, France's Lafarge, and Holcim of Switzerland which supply most of the local market, are being offered a joint-venture scheme like the one applied last year to the oil companies in the Orinoco heavy-oil belt.
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