Sept. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Petroleos de Venezuela SA will review proposals from StatoilHydro ASA and Total SA to develop a block in Venezuela’s Orinoco Belt that will require investments of $25 billion over 25 years.

PDVSA, as the Venezuelan state oil company is known, will decide between the two plans in two months, said Eulogio del Pino, PDVSA vice president for exploration and production.

“We could end up with any option,” he told reporters today in Caracas.

Venezuela is seeking to develop the Orinoco Belt, a heavy crude-oil producing region stretching along the Orinoco River, as output falls from existing Lake Maracaibo fields. Venezuela, the biggest oil exporter in Latin America, aims to increase output to 4.7 million barrels a day by 2015.

France’s Total and Norway’s StatoilHydro, already minority partners in the Petrocedeno heavy-oil project in the Orinoco Belt, are each submitting proposals to develop the Junin 10 block, where Venezuela aims to produce 600,000 barrels a day, del Pino said. The block will need about $25 billion of investments, an estimate that is subject to change, he said today.

“We’re talking about very preliminary estimates,” del Pino said. “It has a margin of error of 50 percent.”

Venezuela and France will sign a “framework agreement” on energy cooperation soon, said Michel Seguin, Total’s vice president of exploration and production for the Americas.

To contact the reporters on this story: Steven Bodzin in Caracas at sbodzin@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: September 23, 2009 15:40 EDT