FORMER Supreme Court Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio yesterday said failure to develop and protect the Recto Bank or Reed Bank in the South China Sea could lead to Luzon facing from 12 to 14-hour blackouts, especially since the Malampaya field is running out of gas.
A 2016 ruling of the Permanent Court of Arbitration has recognized Recto Bank as part of the Philippines’ continental shelf and exclusive economic zone, being situated just 85 nautical miles from mainland Palawan.
It is said to be rich in oil and natural gas but the exploration in the area for the resources has been put on hold since 2012 after then President Benigno Aquino III issued an order freezing all exploration activities in disputed areas.
Beijing is contesting Manila’s claim to the area and it has also refused to abide by the ruling of the Netherlands-based arbitral court.
Carpio said the government must be on guard as losing Recto Bank could bode ill for the country’s oil and gas supply.
“Malampaya is running out of gas. To avoid 12- to 14-hour brownouts, we will have to import liquefied natural gas and that will make our power very expensive. It’s one of the most expensive already in Asia,” Carpio told ABS-CBN News Channel.
“Without Malampaya we’ll be having 12 to 14 hours of daily brownouts in Luzon. Factories will close, schools will close, it will be worse than the pandemic. You cannot even work from home because there’s no power, no internet so we really have to preserve and develop Reed Bank,” he added.
In 2019, President Duterte said the government will ignore the country’s arbitral victory against China to make way for a joint oil and gas exploration deal with Beijing. Duterte said Chinese President Xi Jinping promised to give the Philippines 60 percent of the revenues from the planned oil exploration in the West Philippine Sea in the South China Sea, including the Recto Bank.
In exchange, he said, Xi wants Manila to set aside the arbitral ruling.
However, Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. said then that the memorandum on the joint exploration “makes it unnecessary to set aside the ruling of the arbitral tribunal.”
Carpio also called on the government to build a better outpost for soldiers assigned to guard Ayungin Shoal, instead of just relying on the grounded World War II-era landing ship tank, BRP Sierra Madre, to serve as their quarters.
Ayungin Shoal recently hogged the headlines after three Chinese Coast Guard vessels blocked and fired water cannons two Philippine boats out to deliver supplies to a small Marine contingent in the BRP Sierra Madre.
Carpio said the incident is a “big escalation” in Manila and Beijing’s maritime dispute.
