The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) in a report published on April 7 said that global “renewable” energy generation capacity increased 8.3 percent last year, with global wind power capacity having increased 17 percent and global solar capacity having risen 26 percent since 2010. The figures prompted IRENA director-general Adnan Amin to say: “Renewable energy is now the preferred option for new power generation capacity around the world.”
As the world is embracing sources of renewable energy, the Ministry of Economic Affairs’ energy policies appear to go in the opposite direction.
The ministry recently said that the power shortage caused by the decommissioning of the nation’s nuclear power plants will have to be made up for by coal, natural gas and fossil fuels. Meanwhile, sources of renewable energy, such as wind and solar power, receive no attention from the ministry, much less being treated as “the preferred option for new power generation capacity.”
The ministry said in November last year that wind power depends on a constant supply of wind and that it cannot replace nuclear power, which generates electricity 24 hours a day.
It also said that if the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Gongliao District (貢寮) does not go online, electricity prices would inevitably surge. It is all about the necessity of nuclear power, the ministry’s favorite source of energy, and the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, which it cannot let go of.
Perhaps the ministry can answer the following questions: Has not the operation of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant been in an ongoing state of deferment? Why have the power shortages and the rolling blackouts that the ministry has been warning about never happened? Why has the warning about rising electricity prices more than a year ago not become reality? Why is the price of electricity to fall 9.56 percent beginning this month?
Some politicians and bureaucrats have the tendency to change their policy stances when they hold different positions in the government. The state-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower), on the other hand, changes its stance when the party controlling the Presidential Office changes. When the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), which has a positive view of nuclear power, was dominating the nation’s political landscape, the company said that the Jinshan Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Shihmen District (石門), Guosheng Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Wanli District (萬里) and Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant in Pingtung County’s Ma-anshan (馬鞍山) must not be touched. Taipower also said that if the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant was to be discontinued, there would be electricity shortages and rolling blackouts.
However, after Jan. 16, when the Democratic Progressive Party won both the presidential and legislative elections, the company stopped trying to resume construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, and said that even if the three nuclear power plants were decommissioned, Taiwan would not suffer from power shortages.
This is how Taiwan’s energy policies are determined: Whether a policy is workable or not depends on which party is in power.
Last year, sources of renewable energy, including hydropower, accounted for 3.1 percent of all electricity generated by Taipower. Taiwan receives plenty of sunlight and has a complete solar industry supply chain, but solar power only meets 0.25 percent of the nation’s total electricity demand.
4C Offshore, a wind farm consultancy company, said in January last year that 16 of the world’s 18 best offshore wind farm locations are in the Taiwan Strait, with nine of them inside Taiwan’s territorial waters. Why has Taiwan continued to neglect its outstanding natural advantages? No wonder that in 2014 the electricity generated by Taiwan’s wind power industry was less than three times the electricity generated by solar power plants.
Although “renewable” energy has become the norm in developed nations, such as the US and some European nations, the ministry is not thinking about catching up with them, but is taking a negative attitude, saying that Taiwan should not be too optimistic about the possibility of solar power and offshore wind farms replacing nuclear power.
With that kind of mindset, it is likely that Taiwan will lose the international renewable energy competition not only at the beginning of the game, but also at the finish line as well.
Chang Kuo-tsai is a retired National Hsinchu University of Education associate professor and a former deputy secretary-general of the Taiwan Association of University Professors.
Translated by Ethan Zhan
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