Published
By Myrna M. Velasco
The Department of
Energy (DOE) is gunning for investments of up to $2.376 billion (roughly P124
billion at current peso-dollar exchange rate) on the country’s newly launched
and modified petroleum contracting round – to be fetched both from unsolicited
bids and offers of State-selected petroleum blocks.
The targeted scale of
investments had been initially propped by “unsolicited tenders” on six service
areas already cornered by the department.
These were submitted by
two Filipino-led investor-groups, namely: the Toquero Group or the consortium
of Western Sulu Gulf Oil Corporation, Sulubasin Oil and Gas Corp, Seabed
Crescent Energy Corp. and Offshore Celebes Energy Corporation which had been
been eyeing at least four service areas; and the two other areas covered the
offer of Constellation Energy Corporation.
Energy Undersecretary
Donato D. Marcos disclosed that the first ‘unsolicited proposals’ received by
the DOE “are from rookie players and are applying for underexplored areas”
within the Sulu Sea basin in Mindanao and Ragay Gulf in Luzon’s Bicol
Peninsula.
Marcos indicated that
several other firms are also eyeing petroleum blocks along Ragay Gulf, West
Luzon and Philippine Rise areas, but he noted formal tenders have yet to be
submitted.
For the six areas alone
that are of ‘unsolicited bids’ stature, total investments could be as high as
US$216 million – covering work phases from geological and geophysical surveys,
acquisition of data and up to the drilling of about three exploration and
appraisal wells.
Marcos expounded if all
six petroleum service contracts (PSCs) will be awarded, the sub-phases
component of their work program will call for capital expenditures of US$36
million per service contract.
On top of that, the
energy department is also scheduling soon the offer of 14 petroleum blocks as
pre-determined areas (PDAs) in the repackaged Petroleum Conventional Energy
Contracting Program. These comprise of four areas in West Luzon basin; three
areas in East Palawan; three blocks in Sulu Sea; two areas in Cotabato; and one
each in Cagayan and Agusan-Davao basins.
For these
government-predetermined blocks, targeted investments had been set higher
because the areas are combination of eight shallow and six deep water seismic
survey and exploration activities.
Marcos explained that
drilling cost per well in shallow waters amount to US$15 million; while those
in deep waters will require capital outlay of US100 million per well.
No comments:
Post a Comment