Argentina Energy Sources FDC

Argentina FDC
Name: 100th Anniversary of the Discovery of Oil and Gas in Argentina
Issue date: 2007 November 24th

According to some accounts, the first Argentine oilfield was discovered by chance on December 13th, 1907 while looking for a water supply for the recently founded city of Comodoro Rivadavia. Other accounts point, however, that geological and mineralogical explorations had already been conducted by the government for three years. In 1911, a decree signed by President Roque Roque Sáenz Peña established the General Direction of Oil Exploitation at Comodoro Rivadavia. In 1922, near the end of his first term in office, President Hipólito Yrigoyen founded Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales (YPF); President Alvear appointed Colonel Enrique Mosconi as director. Under his administration, which was then discontinued by the coup that toppled the second term in office of President Irigoyen, prospecting efforts were doubled and improved, petrol trade was launched, fuel prices were lowered, and an oil refinery was opened in La Plata, in 1925. Also, there was a drive towards creating a legal framework able to protect national rights over a resource coveted by international interests, althought this effort was partially successful, as the move was resisted by oligarchic sectors and even by Irigoyen's own party. In the future, that struggle would pervade the history of our country.