Congress has called on the Energy Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy to be proactive in ensuring energy security after a major liquefied natural gas facility project in Batangas encountered delays.

While keeping quiet on the culprit, House Committee on Energy vice chairperson Rodante Marcoleta said that the missed commitment may endanger natural gas plants amid the fast depleting Malampaya reserves.

Five power plants that run from natural gas — Avion, Ilijan, San Gabriel, San Lorenzo and Sta. Rita — provides 30 percent of the power supply in Luzon.

These facilities are shifting to imported liquefied natural gas that would need terminals to reconvert LNG into natural gas before these are supplied as fuel to the power plants.

Marcoleta said that the company which he did not name reneged on the agreement that it will put up an LNG terminal that will reprocess the imported fuel.

Marcoleta was likely referring to the delayed project of infrastructure giant Atlantic, Gulf and Pacific Company in a tie-up with San Miguel Corp. energy arm SMC Global Power.

The Department of Energy had directed the proponents to explain the deferred commercial operation date of the LNG terminal project.

The LNG complex had targeted commercial operations to start last August but it moved its opening to the end of the year.

Gas bottlenecks

It cited bottlenecks in the international gas market as a result of the lingering Eastern European conflict and the pandemic for the project's delay.

The DoE is now requiring AG&P and SMC Global Power to submit a detailed list of "pending activities with timeline and justification as the basis for review and approval of the requested extension."

The LNG project involves two phases starting with an offshore import facility with an initial capacity of 5 million metric tons a year. The next phase will be a longer-term development for an onshore terminal.