The sleepy town of Pagbilao, Quezon province may soon turn into a vibrant energy port, filling up LNG tankers coming from various points in Asia.
An Australian company is in the advanced stages of securing funding for a planned 300-megawatt combined cycle gas power plant in Grande Island, Pagbilao and a $210-million liquefied natural gas terminal that will supply fuel to the station.
Pagbilao, a first-class town with a population of 83,831, faces Tayabas Bay and offers an ideal berthing site for large cargo ships. The town hosts the 735-MW Pagbilao coal-fired plant of TeaM Energy.
Energy World International Ltd. of Australia, according to a report of the Energy Department, has secured the commitment of Standard Chartered Bank to fund the power plant and the LNG hub that will process and supply fuel. The terminal is key to the operations of the new power plant because it will serve as the receiving facility and fuel supplier to the combined cycle gas power plant of Energy World.
The Pagbilao LNG facility, meanwhile, is expected to complement the operations of Energy World in the Asia-Pacific rim. The company has primary gas and power operations in Sengkang, South Sulawesi in Indonesia. It produces gas, power and LNG in Australia.
The LNG hub, set for commissioning by December this year, has drawn the interest of local companies and financing institutions. “Under confidentiality agreements, we have received very strong interest from financiers and industrialists in the Philippines to co-invest and develop the hub terminal,” Energy World informed the Energy Department.
The interest is not surprising. The LNG hub can serve as the distribution base of other power producers in Asia and the transport sector.
The Australian company plans to build the LNG terminal in two phases. The first involves the construction of a 130,000-cubic meter LNG storage tank, regasification facility, jetty and supporting infrastructure estimated to cost $130 million. The second phase will include an additional 130,000-cubic meter LNG storage tank costing $80 million.
More LNG power plants
The LNG Terminal in Pagbilao could force TeaM Energy to rethink its plan of expanding its coal-fired power plant by 400 megawatts in favor of the cleaner fuel. TeaM Energy president Federico Puno earlier said his company and Aboitiz Power Corp., which administers the supply contract of the Pagbilao plants, could build a separate 400-MW power plant costing between $600 million and $700 million.
Puno has hinted at the possibility of TeaM Energy putting up an LNG power plant, instead of coal. But the logistics required in building an LNG power plant are enormous. The power station will need an LNG terminal to supply the fuel
“If we do LNG, it has to be 1,000 MW. You have to put up your own receiving facility, you need to have at least 1,000 MW as host power plant to justify it,” says Puno.
Eneregy World’s planned LNG terminal in the same town will virtually address Puno’s concerns.
Shell stays put
Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp., a unit of the Royal Dutch Shell Group, has virtually shelved its plan to expand its refinery in Tabangao, Batangas and make it a regional hub. But the company has remained bullish on its prospects on the Philippine economy, committing to infuse over $1 billion worth of new investments.
Shell is upgrading the Tabangao refinery, which has a daily capacity of 110,000 barrels and pursuing a $1-billion investment in a proposed liquefied natural gas facility, also in Batangas.
Shell’s decision to defer a decision to expand the Tabangao refinery may hasten the plan of an unnamed Dubai-listed petroleum company to lease at least 100 hectares of land in Bataan from PNOC Alternative Fuels Corp. in Bataan.
The Dubai company has proposed an oil-based facility in Bataan that will serve as its Southeast Asian hub. The facility could be a refinery, or a regional depot that will store crude oil for distribution in East Asia, including Japan and China.
(Published in the Manila Standard Today newspaper on /2012/June/21) source
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