Malampaya restart clears way for new gas wells

Prime Energy has brought the Malampaya Deep Water Gas-to-Power Project back online after a month-long maintenance shutdown, removing a key hurdle to the startup of new gas wells that are expected to extend the country’s largest indigenous gas field by up to six years.

The company confirmed on Friday that gas deliveries resumed as scheduled at 12:01 a.m. on 15 July following routine maintenance and major upgrades across Malampaya’s offshore and onshore facilities.

Completed turnaround

The completed turnaround also readied the project’s infrastructure for the integration of the Malampaya East-1 and Camago-3 wells under the Malampaya Phase 4 (MP4) project, which are expected to deliver first gas by the end of the year.

“Completing this turnaround safely is essential to maintaining the reliability of Malampaya’s operations and supporting the country’s energy needs,” Prime Energy president and chief executive officer Donnabel Kuizon Cruz said.

“This activity was also critical to preparing our facilities for the next phase of indigenous gas production so that homes, businesses and industries continue to benefit from a reliable domestic energy source,” she added.

The turnaround covered the Shallow Water Platform off northwest Palawan and the Onshore Gas Plant in Tabangao, Batangas City, where hundreds of engineers, technicians, offshore specialists, marine crews and contractors carried out maintenance, inspection and engineering work on offshore facilities, subsea infrastructure and onshore systems.

Campaign safely finished

Prime Energy said the campaign was completed safely and gas production resumed on schedule despite weather-related challenges.

The company also coordinated the planned outage with the Department of Energy, the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines and its power generation customers to ensure alternative fuel arrangements were in place while Malampaya was offline.

For more than two decades, Malampaya has supplied indigenous natural gas to power plants in Batangas, providing a key source of fuel for the Luzon grid while helping reduce the country’s dependence on imported fuels.

The Phase 4 expansion is expected to sustain that role by unlocking fresh gas from the Malampaya East-1 and Camago-3 wells.