The Department of Energy said Sunday that China’s latest oil discovery is not within the Philippines’ jurisdiction in the West Philippine Sea.
“I don’t have a map of the Kaiping oil field, but it’s nearer to Guangdong province of mainland China than to the West Philippine Sea,” Energy Secretary Raphael Lotilla said when asked for comment.
CNOOC Ltd., China’s state-owned oil company, announced a new oil discovery in the South China Sea containing over 100 million tons of oil equivalent proved in-place, according to wire reports based on the company statement.
“Unlike countries with expansive claims without any basis in international law, the Philippines only asserts its maritime jurisdiction consistent with UNCLOS,” Lotilla said.
The Philippines and China have been at loggerheads over oil and gas exploration in the WPS, prompting the suspension of some service contracts due to the territorial dispute.
PXP Energy Corp. was unable to conduct exploratory drilling at the Recto Bank, said to be one of the gas-rich prospects in the country amid the dispute.
The DOE is pushing for more oil and gas exploration to promote the energy sector. It is offering for development a predetermined area (PDA)-BP-1, which encompasses Cotabato City and the provinces of Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, and Maguindanao del Norte, covering 229,240 hectares and situated in the Cotabato Basin.
PDA-BP-2 and PDA-BP-3 are both situated in the Sulu Sea Basin with areas of 780,000 hectares and 532,083 hectares, respectively.
The DOE said that for the 2024 Philippine Bid Round, two PDAs in Northwest Palawan and Southern Cebu are offered for petroleum development and production.
The Offshore Northern Palawan or PDA-DP-1, 60 km. off the northern coast of Busuanga Island, covers 100,000 hectares. It includes five wells, which led to the discovery of the Calauit and Calauit South oilfields, with estimated reserves of 5.5 to 6.1 million barrels of oil (MMbbls).
PDA-DP-2, a well-explored area in Cebu, has multiple surface geology, seismic, and well reports in the Visayas Basin. The area covering 58,638 hectares has estimated resources of 26.3 to 31.9 MMbbls of oil, with favorable amounts of gas appearing in other exploratory wells.
Recent production from six wells in the block, which produced 19,791.26 barrels of crude oil from 2018 to 2023, is located in the municipality of Alegria.