Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. plans to invest as much as P2.8 billion to put up 50 to 70 new retail stations next year.
Shell country manager Cesar Romero told reporters about 40 percent of the stations would be located in Luzon and 60 percent in the Visayas and Mindanao.
The company has 966 existing stations to date. Shell is the country’s second biggest oil company, operating a 110,000-barrel-per-day refinery in Batangas.
“This is the investment we’ve set aside every year, 40 percent of which will be located in Luzon and 60 percent in Vis-Min. We have a huge capex [capital expenditure]. A large station costs about P25 [million] to P40 million to construct,” Romero said.
He said Shell stations were normally huge and had high standards, thus more expensive to build.
Romero said aside from retail expansion, the company planned to put up a bitumen facility and improve its Batangas refinery.
He earlier said the company was still evaluating the improvements needed to undertake for the refinery.
The company completed this year its refinery upgrade program costing $150 million that allowed Shell to meet the new Philippine National Standards for ‘Euro IV (PH)’ grade diesel and gasoline.
“Certainly, the bitumen facility is expected be up and running probably in two to three years. The efficiency improvement is to early to tell,” Romero said.
Romero said the investment cost for the bitumen facility “would be about a reasonable chunk of money.”
“We are very excited about that because it will allow us to produce bitumen. As we all know, infrastructure is a priority in the country. It allows us to participate more in the road building,” Romero said.
