Bigger geothermal field bared

Manila Standard Today
By Alena Mae S. Flores | Aug. 16, 2015 at 10:30pm

The Maibarara geothermal field in Batangas province has additional steam reserves equivalent to 26 megawatts of electricity, according to a study conducted by Sinclair Knight Merz of New Zealand.

Maibarara Geothermal Inc. is currently expanding the existing Maibarara geothermal power project by an additional 10 MW to bring the total output to 30 MW once completed by 2017.

Maibarara tapped SKM to conduct a comprehensive third-party technical review of the geothermal field, which showed another potential of 10 MW to 26 MW of power output south of and outside of the current area of development.

“Since this area is not being tapped at the moment for the 20-MW project, MGI preferred not to estimate such reserves at the moment. However, this provides additional confidence for future development for the project,” the company said in a report to the Philippine Stock Exchange.

SKM’s review included analysis of the resource assessment performed in-house, as well as a separate SKM reserve estimation and numerical modeling of the Maibarara reserves.

Maibarara said its own simulation indicated proven reserves of 27.8 MW for 25 years while SKM calculated reserves at 44 MW.

The company completed tests in June, supporting a 10-MW expansion of the Maibarara geothermal project.

Maibarara is a joint-venture company owned by PetroGreen Energy Inc. (65 percent), Trans-Asia Oil & Energy Development Corp. (25 percent), and PNOC Renewables Corp. (10 percent).

PetroGreen is a subsidiary of PetroEnergy Resources Corp. of the Yuchengco Group.

Maibarara currently operates an integrated 20-MW geothermal power facility in Sto. Tomas, Batangas that started commercial operations in February 8, 2014.

The company started its expansion project in the second half of 2014 by drilling two new wells (MB15RD and MB16D), which were successfully completed 5 days and 14 days ahead of schedule, respectively.

MB16D was flow-tested from December 2014 to February 2015, while MB15RD underwent similar discharge tests from April to May 2015.

Maibarara said MB15RD, which was originally designed and drilled as an injection well, attained commercial wellhead pressure, mass flow and MW output at full-bore opening at the end of May.

The 10-MW expansion is estimated to cost P1.3 billion, company officials said earlier.

Maibarara Geothermal president Francisco Delfin Jr. earlier the company would proceed with the financial closing for 70 percent of the project cost by August and shortly after the start of the construction.

Delfin said talks with potential buyers of the expanded output were still ongoing. source