BY EUAN PAULO C. AÑONUEVO REPORTER

ExxonMobil Exploration and Production Philippines B.V., the local unit of United States oil giant ExxonMobil, has completed drilling its third petroleum exploration well in the South Sulu Sea.

Jose Rene Almendras, Department of Energy secretary, said that the recent well drilled by the petroleum exploration and development company in Service Contract 56 (SC) in offshore Sulu showed signs of gas.

“Palendag-1A well was drilled to a total depth of 4,756 meters or 15,604 feet and encountered gas.

Drilling in that well began on June 7. It is the second well that encountered gas in SC 56 block,” he said.

SC 56 covers an area of 8,200 square kilometers. It is located about 900 kilometers southwest of Manila and 200km northwest of Bongao, the capital of Tawi-Tawi province.

ExxonMobil is the contractor of the exploration block. Its partners in the project are BHP Billiton International Exploration Pty. Ltd. of Australia and Mitra Energy Ltd. of Malaysia.

The consortium completed drilling of the block’s first exploration well, Dabakan-1, in December last year and the second one, Banduria-1, in February this year at a cost of about $100 million for each well.

Almendras said that the SC 56 consortium is currently analyzing results of its recent drilling activities and has committed to drill another exploration well in the petroleum block.

“[ExxonMobil] plans to drill immediately in SC 56 a fourth exploration well—Babendil-1, to a total depth of 4,531 meters [14,865 feet] using the drilling rig West Aqua-rius,” he added.

The Energy department estimates the block to contain petroleum reserves of about 750 million barrels of oil equivalent, which can supply the entire domestic market for a period of seven years.

At present, the country produces only less than 10 percent of its 300,000-barrel daily oil requirement.

Bulk of this demand goes to the transport sector, making local pump prices susceptible to price fluctuations in the international market.