Marsaioli said Petrobras intends to reopen the Paulinia refinery, known as Replan, at half-capacity given the fire early on Monday that affected part of the facility. The unaffected part may go back into oil rig flanges gulf coast production a week after procedures for reopening are completed, Marsaioli said.

Petrobras did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Replan accounts for about 20 percent of Petrobras' refining capacity, processing the equivalent of 434,000 barrels of oil per day, according to the company's website.

A Petrobras executive said the incident was serious but that the BOP Blow Out Preventer repair company gulf coast had enough stocks to cover Replan halting operations for 15 days.

(Reporting by Roberto Samora; Writing by Tatiana Bautzer and Alexandra Alper; editing by Jonathan Oatis and Susan Thomas)