CEBU Governor Gwendolyn Garcia has welcomed the proposal of the Department of Energy (DOE) to continue the exploration and drilling of oil and gas in Barangay Montpeller, Alegria town, southwest Cebu, but she suggested that this should be done through a public-private partnership.
The DOE said during a meeting with the governor at the Capitol on Thursday, March 14, 2024, that it still intends to carry out exploration and drilling in the town.
However, the governor proposed collaborating with the private sector in order to do this.
She wants to welcome private companies and allow them to work with Capitol to pursue drilling and exploratory activities aimed at extracting the town's unexplored gas and oil reserves.
“We invite private firms and let them partner with Capitol to pursue exploration and drilling efforts to harness the town’s untapped oil and gas resources,” the governor said.
During the meeting, Energy Undersecretary Alejandro Sales stated that the government is now encouraging private contractors to come in and carry on the town's oil drilling operations because it wants to "still continue exploiting" the town's oil resources.
The DOE is reportedly amenable to the governor's suggestion and will support negotiations with companies interested in partnering with them on oil exploration, according to the Capitol.
To recall, oil service contractor China International Mining Petroleum Co. Ltd. (CIMP) was then producing commercial quantities of natural gas and oil following the estimated discovery of 27.93 million barrels of oil, with a potential production recovery of 3.35 million barrels of crude oil, or a conservative estimate of 12 percent of all oil in place and reserves.
The recoverable resource for natural gas is projected to be 6.6 billion cubic feet, or almost 70 percent of the entire amount of natural gas in place.
About 9.42 billion cubic feet of reserves were detected for the gas.
However, the oil exploration was halted last year after the DOE terminated its contract with CIMP because it could not fulfill its role. (ANV, TPT)