Philippines to require more storage for biofuels

The Philippines will face a growing need for more storage facilities to meet increasing biofuel demand, reduce logistics costs and replace facilities affected by relocation, an industry executive said. Increasing biofuel production in the country might also lead to exports in the future, said Stephen Yu, chief operating officer at SeaOil Philippines Inc. Logistics inefficiency made up a significant portion of petroleum costs and “there is a big opportunity to reduce this,” Yu said. Logistic costs account for almost a third of delivered petroleum product prices, while the shipping cost from Singapore to Batangas in the Philippines was only 2% of costs, he added. The Philippine Reclamation Authority (PRA) hopes to relocate the existing oil depots from Manila’s Pandacan area to a proposed land reclamation site off the Baseco area also in Manila. (June 17/26, 2008)