Philippines Adds Oil Supply, Gas Discovery in Palawan Prepared to Strengthen Energy
JAKARTA - The Philippines is increasing its crude oil supply amid efforts to maintain domestic energy resilience. The Philippine News Agency (PNA), quoted on Friday, March 27, reported that the Philippine government has also begun to prepare additional gas supplies from new discoveries off the coast of Palawan to strengthen energy supplies and reduce electricity costs.
Philippine Energy Minister Sharon Garin said the latest oil shipment from Japan reached around 144,000 barrels. In addition, there are an additional 850,000 barrels scheduled to arrive from several countries in the coming weeks.
According to PNA, the supply was secured after the Philippine government negotiated since the beginning of March with a number of oil-producing countries, including Malaysia and Indonesia. Manila is also still opening talks with India, Argentina, Colombia, and Canada to expand the source of fuel supplies.
This step was taken to keep the availability of fuel in the country stable. The Philippines seems to want to reduce its dependence on limited supply sources, at a time when the global energy market is still easily changeable.
In addition to increasing oil supplies, the Philippine government is also paying attention to the discovery of new natural gas in the Camago-3 well off the coast of Palawan. The well is part of Contract for Service No. 38 managed by Prime Energy.
Garin said that additional production from Camago-3 is expected to strengthen domestic energy supply at a lower cost than imported fuels. According to him, the additional natural gas can also help reduce electricity prices.
PNA also reported that Prime Energy targets the first gas production from the Malampaya Phase 4 project to start flowing in the last quarter of this year. The company said the Camago-3 well is capable of producing up to 60 million standard cubic feet of gas per day.
Prime Energy said the completion of Camago-3 was an important step to increase the Philippines' domestic gas supply.