The Malampaya East-1 (MAE-1) discovery gains added significance beyond augmenting the country’s indigenous natural gas supply as it helps ensure that the costly infrastructure built for Malampaya will not go to waste anytime soon.

Renewable energy expert Alberto Dalusung III, a former government energy official, said the discovery is significant given its projected output of 98-billion cubic feet.

“The original Malampaya was like 2.3-trillion cubic feet, so it’s like four percent of the original find. And remember, we have a 504-kilometer undersea pipeline,” he noted.

He explained that no new discoveries would mean “we will lose the productivity of that pipeline. This one shows that there are such available resources near the Malampaya gas fields.”

Since MAE-1 is very near the current Malampaya gas field, it will be easy to transport the gas through the same pipeline.

The benefits from the new well will be immediate, Dalusung pointed out.

“It’s unlike the original Malampaya gas field. Remember, Malampaya was discovered 30 years ago. But when did we have the first production from Malampaya? It was like the year 2000, as I recall. That means you needed the time, the long time between discovery of the first Malampaya, to build that pipeline,” Dalusung said.

“Now we have it. We don’t have to build a pipeline. All we had to do was find new gas resources, which we did, thankfully,” he added.

The process of obtaining indigenous natural gas to fuel power plants is easier compared to importing liquefied natural gas (LNG), he said.

“You liquefy it and you transport it. Once it’s here, you regasify it. It’s not an easy process,” he noted.

With the new Malampaya natural gas streaming in, a more stable operation of existing gas power plants is expected.

“Remember, these gas power plants were meant to use, were designed to use, Malampaya gas,” Dalusung said.

Lower power costs and improved electricity supply are expected as a result of the positive development.

Dalusung is confident of more discoveries in the Malampaya field.

“The main point is — and you know I was with the Ministry of Energy before the DoE a long time ago — my friends in the oil and gas sector have told me where there are a lot of smaller plays around or near Malampaya. Those smaller plays will not be viable without the pipeline,” he said.

“There are possibly other similar gas plates, hopefully larger and taken in aggregate they would probably be very significant compared to the original Malampaya,” Dalusung said.

The prospect of lower electricity rates is greater with the discovery of MAE-1. Natural gas is cheaper than coal, which is the basic fuel for power generation at this time.

The government, aside from announcing the indigenous fuel source, should now develop an improved program to take advantage of it.

As the energy veteran explained, “It’s already there; I think the new find is pointing the way.”

What is needed from the government, the beneficiary of royalties from the natural resource extraction, is to ensure that development proceeds smoothly.