UPDATE 2-Chevron sees US deepwater moratorium lifted "soon"

* Chevron CEO sees U.S. deepwater moratorium lifted "soon"

* Believes regulators want to lift it, but in proper way

* Says evidence shows BP's spill "utterly preventable" (Adds quotes on renewable energy, Venezuela, paragraphs 8-13)

By Braden Reddall

MENLO PARK, Calif., Oct 6 (Reuters) - Chevron Corp (CVX.N) Chief Executive John Watson expects the U.S. deepwater drilling moratorium put in place after BP Plc's (BP.L) disastrous Gulf of Mexico accident to be lifted "soon."

"I can't predict a date," he said, but he saw a desire in Washington to lift it. "In our discussions that we have had with regulators, I think there's a desire to do it. I think they're working on the details so that they can do it in the proper way and assure the public that the business is safe."

In an on-stage interview in Silicon Valley hosted by the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday, Watson said all the evidence released so far about the drilling disaster in April has shown it should not have happened.

"We took a close look at the causes and the reasons that it happened, and I think everyone that's taken a look at that has said that it's utterly preventable," Watson said. "There were a series of things that had to go wrong and not be addressed in order for that incident to happen."

Asked about what Chevron has changed since the accident, Watson said the company has sought to ensure all its offshore partners follow best practices, and that the industry has learned its lessons.

"A heart surgeon doesn't perform surgery the same way today that he or she might have 20 years ago, and the same thing is true in our business," he told the audience of investors and executives at a country club in Menlo Park, California.

"We have a culture of trying to learn from any incident, whether it's in our company or whether it affects the industry. There needs to be some humility here."

From the audience, venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, who has raised $1 billion for renewable energy and cleantech funds, challenged Watson to invest more in green energy, saying Khosla Ventures had put in as much money in the new technologies in the past two years as Chevron had in the past decade.

But Watson said the investment weighting toward oil and gas was because that was what Chevron did best, and he expected any shift to newer technologies such as electric cars would be gradual enough to allow his company to respond.

"We can see most of these things coming. But one of the reasons we invest in start-ups and others is so that we can have a better window, so if there's an opportunity to invest, we can jump in with both feet," Watson said.

Chevron will invest $2.3 billion in renewables, including its geothermal operations, in the next three years. But Watson said he would not invest in technology that required subsidies, preferring energy efficiency and fuels that are profitable now.

Looking to South America, when asked why Chevron had been able to remain in Venezuela, while other big oil companies had left, Watson credited its heavy oil extraction technology.

"We're in Venezuela because I believe President (Hugo) Chavez understands that we're valuable there," he said. (Reporting by Braden Reddall; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick, Bernard Orr)