Taipei 101 Mall has reduced its annual carbon emissions by 3,532 tonnes and cut its power bill by nearly 10 percent after adopting “green” measures, including installing LED lighting, figures released by the mall's engineering team show.
The mall spent NT$119 million (US$4 million) on electricity bills in 2008. However, after adopting green measures, it shaved 9.6 percent, or about NT$10 million, off its bills, said Sheu Jau-fa (許招發), head of the mall’s engineering operations management.
These green measures include changing over to energy-saving lights in the parking lot and installing LED lighting and infrared sensors to control brightness, he said.
Sheu made the remarks at an activity the Ministry of Economic Affairs organized yesterday to promote the work of its energy conservation and greenhouse gas emissions reduction service team.
The team was formed in May as part of the administration’s efforts to synergize the resources of various government agencies to provide a one-stop shop for energy conservation matters.
The agencies include the Bureau of Energy, the Industrial Development Bureau, the National Science Council, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of the Interior.
The team has six divisions covering sectors such as educational institutions, small and medium businesses, manufacturers and green construction.
“In the past, various agencies had similar initiatives to encourage energy conservation, but the resources were scattered,” said Steven Wu (吳志偉), a section chief at the Bureau of Energy.
With the establishment of the team, it is able to combine different agencies’ know-how to better address the needs of the private sector, Wu said.
The team has consultants that can conduct on-site inspections if requested by companies and offer advice and solutions on conserving energy and reducing carbon emissions.
The ministry said the team conducted 3,141 on-site inspections last year, and its analyses showed that those projects could reduce carbon emissions by 735,000 tonnes a year.
Taoyuan-based Yuan Ze University has also employed the team’s services.
The university’s dean of general affairs, Wei Jung-tzung (魏榮宗), said the school was trying hard to reduce its utility bills, which amounted to about NT$60 million a year.
“That amount took up half the annual subsidy from the Ministry of Education,” he said.
Yuan Ze decided to install solar systems to heat water and supply electricity to the campus and dormitories, among other measures.
Now it enjoys savings of about NT$20 million in annual utility bills, Wei said.
CHIP RACE: Three years of overbroad export controls drove foreign competitors to pursue their own AI chips, and ‘cost US taxpayers billions of dollars,’ Nvidia said China has figured out the US strategy for allowing it to buy Nvidia Corp’s H200s and is rejecting the artificial intelligence (AI) chip in favor of domestically developed semiconductors, White House AI adviser David Sacks said, citing news reports. US President Donald Trump on Monday said that he would allow shipments of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China, part of an administration effort backed by Sacks to challenge Chinese tech champions such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為) by bringing US competition to their home market. On Friday, Sacks signaled that he was uncertain about whether that approach would work. “They’re rejecting our chips,” Sacks
NATIONAL SECURITY: Intel’s testing of ACM tools despite US government control ‘highlights egregious gaps in US technology protection policies,’ a former official said Chipmaker Intel Corp has tested chipmaking tools this year from a toolmaker with deep roots in China and two overseas units that were targeted by US sanctions, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the matter. Intel, which fended off calls for its CEO’s resignation from US President Donald Trump in August over his alleged ties to China, got the tools from ACM Research Inc, a Fremont, California-based producer of chipmaking equipment. Two of ACM’s units, based in Shanghai and South Korea, were among a number of firms barred last year from receiving US technology over claims they have
It is challenging to build infrastructure in much of Europe. Constrained budgets and polarized politics tend to undermine long-term projects, forcing officials to react to emergencies rather than plan for the future. Not in Austria. Today, the country is to officially open its Koralmbahn tunnel, the 5.9 billion euro (US$6.9 billion) centerpiece of a groundbreaking new railway that will eventually run from Poland’s Baltic coast to the Adriatic Sea, transforming travel within Austria and positioning the Alpine nation at the forefront of logistics in Europe. “It is Austria’s biggest socio-economic experiment in over a century,” said Eric Kirschner, an economist at Graz-based Joanneum
OPTION: Uber said it could provide higher pay for batch trips, if incentives for batching is not removed entirely, as the latter would force it to pass on the costs to consumers Uber Technologies Inc yesterday warned that proposed restrictions on batching orders and minimum wages could prompt a NT$20 delivery fee increase in Taiwan, as lower efficiency would drive up costs. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi made the remarks yesterday during his visit to Taiwan. He is on a multileg trip to the region, which includes stops in South Korea and Japan. His visit coincided the release last month of the Ministry of Labor’s draft bill on the delivery sector, which aims to safeguard delivery workers’ rights and improve their welfare. The ministry set the minimum pay for local food delivery drivers at
RSS