Gov’t grants exploration contracts to 11 firms

MANILA, Philippines - The Aquino administration has given 11 mining and energy companies the go-signal to explore and develop coal blocks in the Philippines, including two in the disputed West Philippine Sea.

Energy Undersecretary Ramon Allan Oca said the Energy Department has already approved 11 coal contracts, which would have a combined investment of more than P1 billion to fund exploration costs for a two-year period.

The companies that won coal contracts are Altura Mining, a global mining firm with operations in Australia and Indonesia (Area 3), Consunji-led Semirara Mining Corp. (Area 9 and 25b), Empire Asia Mining (Area 18b), SKI Mining (Area 19a), Philippine National Oil Co.-Exploration Corp. (Areas 19b, 29 and 30a),  South Davao Development Co. Inc. (Area 8), Blackstone Mineral Resources (Area 27) and Mega Philippines Inc. (Area 23).

The government earlier offered 30 areas for coal and 15 areas for oil and gas exploration and development under the Philippine Energy Contracting Round 4.

These coal blocks are in Quezon, Camarines Norte, Albay, Sorsogon, Zamboanga Sibugay, Davao Oriental, Bohol and Cebu, among others.

The Energy Department also awarded petroleum contracts to five entities. These are Planet Gas of Australia, the consortium of Philex Mining, PNOC-EC and Petro Energy, Philodrill and Pitkin Petroleum of the United Kingdom, Nor Asian Energy Philippines and Loyz Oil.

The Department of Energy said in the remaining term of the Aquino administration, it would utilize coal energy projects and work to ensure the social acceptability of coal to address to help stabilize the supply of power in the country.

It said that research and development activities would be pursued to improve existing technologies for pollution control in the use of coal.