Mexico is at an energy crossroads. Despite being a country with vast potential in hydrocarbons, its growing dependence on imported natural gas puts its energy safety at risk. To understand challenges and opportunities, it is essential to analyze the balance between current reserves and national demand.
At the beginning of 2024, Mexico had approximately 7,500 BCF (billions of cubic feet) of proven natural gas reserves, according to data from the National Hydrocarbons Commission (CNH) and the oil & Gas Journal.
This figure represents the volume that can be exploited safely and profitably with current technology. However, it only reaches to cover around 1.4 years of national consumption. This calculation is based on the average daily consumption of natural gas in Mexico, which is approximately 8,486 million cubic feet (MMPCD), with data from the Ministry of Energy (Sener) in 2022, which translates into 3,096.5 BCF per year.
This gap has made Mexico a net importer of natural gas, depending on the United States to satisfy about 70% of its consumption. The electricity generation, promoted in large part by combined cycles of natural gas, represents the main use of this energy, followed by the industry and, to a lesser extent, the residential sector.
Mexico has an abundance of prospective resources, estimated at 225,000 BCF, according to a study by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC, 2021). These resources include conventional deposits not yet discovered, mainly in the Gulf of Deep Mexico, as well as unconventional formations in regions such as the Burgos and Sabinas basin.
If these resources were fully developed, they could supply national demand for more than four decades. To convert this potential into proven reserves, significant investments are required in exploration, infrastructure and advanced technologies.
One of the great challenges in this process is environmental risk. Exploration and exploitation, especially in unconventional formations, can have negative impacts on the use of water, soil and air quality. However, emerging drilling technologies, wastewater reuse and seismic monitoring in real time allow to mitigate a good part of these impacts. Adopting strict environmental standards and promoting innovation can turn natural gas into an energy bridge to a cleaner matrix.
The CNH report entitled challenges and opportunities for the production of oil and natural gas of unconventional deposits in Mexico (2022) highlights that the country is among the ten with greater technically recoverable resources of unconventional gas worldwide, but also underlines the regulatory, social and environmental challenges facing its use.
In this context, Mexico must draw a medium and long -term strategy that contemplates investment attraction, strengthening the regulatory framework and the development of key infrastructure, such as gas pipelines and processing plants. Only in this way can its underground wealth be transformed into a safe, affordable and sustainable energy base.
The war in Ukraine and the recent tariff policies of the main trade partner of Mexico convert to the self -sufficiency in natural gas not only a technical or economic goal, but also a strategic imperative in the matter of global sovereignty and geopolitics, to guarantee the country’s safety and energy transition in an increasingly uncertain world.
