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By Euan Paulo C. Añonuevo, Reporter
Weather disturbances have delayed the start of
oil production in the Galoc field in offshore Palawan to early June,
Australian firm Nido Petroleum Ltd said in a statement.
The company cited poor weather conditions in the
past few weeks for the eight-day delay to the hook-up of floating
production, storage and offloading system (FPSO) vessel to
pre-installed undersea facilities in the Galoc field.
The FPSO will function as the field’s oilrig
that suctions off crude at a projected rate of 17,500 barrels per
day. This is expected to boost the Philippines’ monthly oil
production to less than half a million barrels from the present
17,000 barrels per month.
The Galoc field is run by a consortium led by
Galoc Production Co., which has a 58.29-percent share; Nido with a
22.28-percent share; and other local upstream oil companies.
The consortium initially targeted to produce its
first oil from the field last April, but delays in the
pre-commissioning of the FPSO, mechanical troubles and adverse
weather conditions subsequently pushed its target date to end of May
and then to early June.
The Galoc field is located in petroleum service
contract (SC) 14C off the shores of North West Palawan. Initial
studies on the block estimate it to contain 10 million barrels of
oil.
It is the first oil development project
undertaken in the country for over a decade since West Linapacan and
the first offshore development in seven years since Malampaya.
The field was discovered in 1981 and it and
yielded oil during production tests in the late 1980s. However,
Galoc was never developed as it was then deemed not commercially
viable because of low crude prices.
However, skyrocketing oil prices and new oil
development technologies have made the current efforts in the Galoc
field and other sites across the county economically viable, boding
well for the Philippines, which is a net importer of oil.
Other previously discovered oil resources being
actively considered for development include Calauit in SC 50; Nido
1X1 straddling the SC 14 and SC 54 areas; Octon in SC 6A; and West
Linapacan in SC 14C.
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