Brazil's state-owned oil giant Petrobras announced Wednesday it has discovered light oil in the Santos Basin in southeast Brazil.

About 80 percent of the oil produced by the company is heavy oil.

The company said in a statement that the new discovery of light oil shows the "positive results" of oil exploration in Brazil, particularly in the deep water area in the Santos Basin, Sao Paulo state.

The exploratory well is located 273 km off the country's Atlantic coast, at a depth of 2,140 meters in the BM-S-9 block in Santos Basin.

Initial tests in the vertical well suggest a production of 2,900 barrels of oil and 57,000 cubic meters of gas per day, with flow limited by the test's operating facility and safety restrictions, the company said.

The oil reaches 27 degrees in the American Petroleum Institute scale, the statement said.

Further test assessments and new geological studies are being conducted to prove whether the new reserves have "good productivity characteristics and economically viable volumes."

New investments will be made in drilling new wells and developing technologies in exploring oil in deep waters, it said.