Oil and Gas. The country has 16 sedimentary basins with a combined potential of 4,777 million barrels of fuel oil equivalent (MMBFOE) or 689.8 MTOE of oil and gas reserves.
An additional 150 billion cubic feet (BCF) of gas have been recovered from the seventh well of the Malampaya which could fuel a 300 MW natural gas power plant for a period of 12 years. Existing oil and gas fields yielded an output of 2.92 MMB of oil coming mostly from the Galoc Field, which began producing in October 2008. With two production wells, Galoc Field has an average daily production of 14,000 barrels. Production for the first semester of 2010 was registered at 1.75 MB of oil, 56.51 million standard cubic feet (MMSCF) of gas and 2.16 MB of condensate.
Despite a favorable business experience in the upstream energy sector, the social acceptability of these projects still needs to be addressed.
Coal. The Philippines currently has 13 coal basins with a total resource potential of 2.4 billion metric tons (BMT). Indigenous coal production in 2009 reached 4.7 million metric tons (MMMT or 10,000 BTU/lb), a 29.9 percent increase over the 3.6 MMMT produced in 2008. This is due to the robust output of Semirara Mining Corporation, which contributed 4.36 MMMT or 93.1 percent of the total coal production. As of the first half of 2010, coal production had reached 3.6 MMMT, which was 38.2 percent higher than the coal output during the same period in 2009.
Social acceptability, environmental sustainability, and the country's low-grade coal are challenges that need to be addressed.