The acquisition of El Segundo-based Unocal Corp. last week left just one player standing in the local oilman’s club: Occidental Petroleum Corp.

But don’t count on Oxy to be picked off next.

With a market cap of $29 billion, the Los Angeles-based energy company remains much smaller than the so-called super-majors such as ChevronTexaco Corp., which agreed to acquire Unocal for $16.4 billion. Both Unocal and Atlantic Richfield Co., which was gobbled up by BP Amoco Plc in 1999, have succumbed to a super-major.

Yet Occidental is considered fiercely independent and more likely to buy than be bought.

At a time when the largest oil companies are de-emphasizing their on-shore U.S. assets, Occidental is looking to add to its U.S. portfolio especially in Texas and California.

“We expect to be expanding our domestic operations,” said Occidental spokesman Larry Meriage.

The company has a history of hovering around the merger table for leftovers, picking up the forced divestiture of BP Amoco and Royal Dutch/Shell’s West Texas joint venture, Altura Energy, for $3.6 billion in 2000.

Now the largest oil producer in Texas, Occidental may be the one to catch any properties that shake out of the Unocal deal. ChevronTexaco said it expects to sell about $2 billion in assets after the merger, widely believed to involve both companies’ holdings in Texas and California.

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The full version of this story

is available in the April 11 edition of the Los Angeles Business Journal.