Biography
Luis A. Pacheco, Ph.D., is a nonresident fellow at the Baker Institute Center for Energy Studies. He has more than 35 years of experience in the energy industry, including 17 years at Venezuela’s national oil company PDVSA, where he held a number of senior positions, such as CEO of BITOR, PDVSA’s heavy oil affiliate, and executive director of corporate planning. He was special advisor on strategy and energy to the president of Venezuela’s CANTV from 2005 to 2007 as well as advisor of the National Hydrocarbons Agency in Colombia. From 2004 to 2007, he was co-owner and president of a management consulting firm, working with companies such as Repsol, Pemex and the World Bank, amongst others. From 2008 to 2016, he was senior vice president of planning and information technology at Pacific Exploration & Production, formerly Pacific Rubiales Energy, the largest private oil and gas company in Colombia and Peru.
Pacheco has lectured at Universidad Simon Bolivar in Venezuela and has also been a guest lecturer at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Administration in Venezuela, University of Los Andes in Colombia, the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education in Mexico, Harvard University and Georgetown University. Pacheco received a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering from the University of Zulia in Venezuela, an M.Sc. from Manchester University and a Ph.D. from the University of London.
Contact at pachecola@gmail.com or 713-348-2217.
Recent Publications
The Sudden Transition
“Forcing the energy transition, not only in a country or in a sector, but on the entire planet and its economy is a bold and very risky experiment,” wrote nonresident fellow Luis A. Pacheco in a recent commentary. The full piece, which cautions against moving too quickly away from fossil fuels, is available in Spanish in La Gran Aldea.
LOREICH, A Dividing Oil Tale
The legislation that nationalized Venezuela's oil industry almost 50 years ago — called LOREICH — is part of a story without a happy ending, wrote nonresident fellow Luis A. Pacheco, in an article exploring its place in the country's oil history.