On the 22nd anniversary of the US's worst ever nuclear accident -- the Three Mile Island incident -- anti-nuclear activists in Taiwan yesterday released the results of an independent investigation into Taiwan's most recent and worst nuclear accident, the fire at the Third Nuclear Power Plant (
The investigation raised serious questions about the ability of the government's energy departments to handle and prevent mishaps at Taiwan's nuclear power plants.
The fire on March 18 at the plant was triggered in part by transmission problems which occurred on March 17. The malfunction, said to have been caused by a buildup of salt crystals on transmission wires, led to a short circuit that sparked the blaze.
Although the accident caused neither release of radiation nor damage to electrical generators, it was still rated by the Atomic Energy Council (AEC) as the worst of its kind in Taiwan's history.
Activists of the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union (TEPU,
"We doubt that they have been trained professionally because they could not give us reasonable answers," said TEPU Chairman Shih Shin-min (
Activists said that the malfunctions of backup power generators, which caused the fire, should have been avoided.
Wang San-chi (
"The design of electrical systems at the plant is inadequate and the AEC is unaware of the systems' weaknesses," Wang said.
Wang attributed the malfunctions of electrical systems to the AEC's lax regulations.
A report written by Komura Hiroo (
On March 28, 1979, a cooling system malfunction led to a partial meltdown of one of Three Mile Island's reactor cores and caused the release of nearly a million gallons of radioactive coolant water into the nearby Susquehanna River.
A radiation leak alert was broadcast, prompting the evacuation of about 140,000 people from neighboring areas.
The US government spent US$1 billion on a cleanup program following the incident.
The accident brought about sweeping changes involving emergency response planning, reactor operator training, human factors, engineering, radiation protection and many other areas of nuclear power plant operations.
National Science Council Chairman Wei Che-ho (魏哲和), also the leader of a Cabinet task force established to investigate the fire, denied that the design of electrical systems at the plant was at fault.
"If we look at the plant in terms of electrical engineering, its backup power supply systems are sufficient," Wei said.
Wei said that two US electrical engineering professors will join his team this weekend to carry out an investigation at the plant immediately. Wei said that a conclusion would be reached by next Wednesday, when he will submit a report to the premier, Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄).
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
BEIJING’S ‘PAWN’: ‘We, as Chinese, should never forget our roots, history, culture,’ Want Want Holdings general manager Tsai Wang-ting said at a summit in China The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday condemned Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) for making comments at the Cross-Strait Chinese Culture Summit that it said have damaged Taiwan’s sovereignty, adding that it would investigate if the group had colluded with China in the matter and contravened cross-strait regulations. The council issued a statement after Want Want Holdings (旺旺集團有限公司) general manager Tsai Wang-ting (蔡旺庭), the third son of the group’s founder, Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), said at the summit last week that the group originated in “Chinese Taiwan,” and has developed and prospered in “the motherland.” “We, as Chinese, should never
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification