Minority wants Malampaya billions firewalled from Bataan nuke project

The Senate minority wants the P188 billion unspent government share from Malampaya and other energy projects "firewalled" from being used to finance the restarting of the mothballed Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP).

Minority Leader Ralph Recto said there should be "no funding pipeline from Malampaya to the Bataan plant," whose rehabilitation had been approved by Malacañang.

Recto said the Department of Energy, which has a proposed budget of P1.1 billion for 2017, is allowed, under a special provision in next year's budget, to tap P1.52 billion in off-budget accounts for "energy resource development and exploitation programs."

The P1.52 billion shall be taken from "pooled fees and revenues" from ongoing energy production projects, the biggest of which is the Malampaya gas field off Northern Palawan.

Recto said tapping Malampaya funds may be used "to partially finance an independent scientific study on the economic and technical feasibility of completing the plant."

"Maaring hanggang study lang. But not restarting. Even using the funds to study its viability ay dapat suriing mabuti," he said.

The Malampaya royalties fund posted an outstanding balance of P182.29 billion as of June 22, 2016. This year, Malampaya remittances are projected to hit P34.7 billion.

But the total amount of revenues from all projects is P188 billion, according to national budget documents for 2017. The said amount is kept in trust and is treated as off-budget item.

Recto had earlier said that the decision to greenlight the BNPP to rehabilitate must come from scientists, "based on an unassailable study whose conclusion is that a dead plant can be safely resurrected beyond reasonable doubt."

"It should be a science-based decision, and not because someone has a 'light bulb' moment and then immediately orders that the plant be switched on," he said.

In addition to independent safety checks, Recto said that an economic study is also needed.

Recto said the country paid almost P70 billion for an overpriced plant that never produced a single watt of electricity.

The minority leader said a special provision barring the use of accumulated state energy revenues from financing the reconstruction of the more than three decades old facility can be written into the budget of the DOE.