Marcos meets Energy team without a chief 

PRESIDENT Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. on Thursday met with officials of the Energy department, which he has yet to appoint a secretary for.   

The meeting tackled the agency’s direction under the new administration, Mr. Marcos said in a post on his social media pages.  

“Amid the global crisis of rising oil prices, one of our key partners in the response is the Department of Energy,” he wrote in Filipino.   

Press Secretary Trixie Cruz-Angeles earlier said the new Philippine leader is carefully choosing the next DoE secretary, who is expected to work with various agencies to address the country’s energy woes amid increasing pressures for the government to shift to renewables. 

The shocks of high fuel costs have rocked the Philippine economy, pushing inflation last month to its highest level in almost four years.  

The next DoE chief also needs to address the declining output of the country’s natural gas field in the South China Sea.  

Fitch Solutions Country Risk & Industry Research said in a note in August last year that the depletion of the country’s only indigenous gas field is “problematic” since it accounts for 30% of Luzon’s power generation and services 20% of national demand.  

Various groups have been urging the government to heavily invest in renewables, saying the shift to green energy is the only way to solve a potential supply crisis. — Kyle Aristophere T. Atienza