In response to the Cabinet’s announcement yesterday that all taxis countrywide should run on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), or autogas, within four years, the state-owned oil refiner CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) said that deregulation measures will be necessary to achieve the goal.
Unless the government implements such measures, CPC said, the government’s plan will be difficult to carry out, as it normally takes up to 4.5 years to prepare, build and obtain a license to operate LPG stations.
In addition, CPC said between 80 percent and 90 percent of the nation’s taxis operate in Taipei, where gas stations are generally smaller, which poses a problem. Regulations for autogas stations stipulate safety distance requirements that would make it a challenge to provide LPG at existing gas stations in Taipei, it said.
“The Taipei City government has already said that there is no need to hold public discussions and that the government should push for deregulation to speed up the promotion of LPG stations,” CPC vice president and spokesman Chu Shao-hua (朱少華) said at a press conference yesterday.
Chu said the process of setting up adequate autogas stations would require at least two years of preparation — including public meetings and environmental evaluations — one year to build the facilities and another year and a half to secure licenses.
There are 23 autogas stations countrywide operated by CPC and its retailers, and CPC plans to add another 50 such stations in the next three to five years.
The Taipei Times’ sister newspaper, the Liberty Times, reported that based on the government’s floating oil price mechanism, domestic gasoline and diesel prices will likely go up NT$1.2 per liter and NT$1.3 per liter respectively next month.
In response to media speculation, Chu said CPC was only an executor and did not set fuel prices. Unless the government adopts a new policy, CPC will follow the floating oil price mechanism and raise its prices.
“The final decision as to whether to adjust CPC’s oil prices next month will be announced on the company’s Web site on Aug. 1 at 5pm,” Chu said, without elaborating.
Earlier yesterday, Minister of Economic Affairs Yiin Chii-ming (尹啟銘) said the government had not ruled out asking CPC to cut fuel prices next month if global oil prices continue to decline next week.
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