The profitability of Yuchengco-led PetroEnergy Resources Corporation (PERC) accelerated by 30-percent to P863 million in 2022 from a leaner P665 million in the prior year. The company indicated that the income upturn had been partly attributed to higher profit contribution of its petroleum production at the Etame consortium in Gabon, West Africa; which had more than offset the decline in its electricity sales in its Philippine business operations. Correspondingly, the income attributable to the equity holders of PERC ended up higher at P549 million; posting an upswing of 69-percent from P325 million in 2021.” As emphasized by PERC, its oil revenues had climbed by 57-percent to P726 million last year, versus P461 million in 2021; and that had been mainly “driven by significant increase in global crude prices during the period.” Based on data provided by the company, the average selling price for oil lifted from its petroleum concession in West Africa had been at $106.27 per barrel in 2022 versus the previous year’s $69.90 per barrel. To note, the year 2022 has been marked as the other era of ‘super spikes’ in oil prices; especially around first to second quarter of last year – or the weeks and months immediately after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February last year. Meanwhile, the Yuchengco firm conveyed that its power sales had been down by 11-percent “due largely to the one-month preventive maintenance shutdown of the 20-megawatt Maibarara-1 and the 12MW Maibarara-2 power plants in February 2022.” Onward, the company is very much keen on aggressively expanding its ventures in the renewable energy sector – including those on solar as well as the expansion of its wind farm project in Aklan. The bigger ticket investments that the company has been packaging will be those on offshore wind projects, along with its Danish firm-partner Copenhagen Energy. If investment plans will be concretized, the PERC would be able to add up to 4,000MW of offshore wind capacity into the country’s energy mix; and that will form part of the ‘energy transition agenda’ being pushed by the government.”