Print

Mail

wiki links

One Year On: Society - Administration fails to find solutions to environmental problems

By Chiu Yu-Tzu
STAFF REPORTER
Sunday, May 20, 2001, Page 21

Activists say that President Chen Shui-bian's administration has done little to ensure that the environment does not suffer at the expense of economic development. FILE PHOTO

Environmental activists once believed that the DPP's victory in the presidential election last year would lead to the establishment of a new paradigm -- a government that put environmental concerns at the heart of the administration.

On the eve of the anniversary of the DPP's taking the helm of national leadership, however, environmentalists bitterly criticized the DPP-led government, saying it has failed to address environmental problems in a new way.

"The DPP did not use the handover of power to alter the former KMT-led government's old model -- that economic development takes precedence -- to a new way of thinking for years promoted by the DPP, which emphasizes the significance of sound environmental policy," said Lai Wei-chieh (賴偉傑), secretary-general of the Green Citizens' Action Alliance (GCAA, 綠色公民行動聯盟).

Taking the resumption of the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant (核四) as an example, Lai says that the government eventually gave in to opposition parties after a month-long political struggle without trying hard enough to win the public relations battle for the hearts and minds of the people. According to Lai, the government missed an opportunity to shape public opinion by introducing a new energy policy to Taiwan.

Although Lin Jun-yi (林俊義), a well-known anti-nuclear activist who has good relations with the DPP, took over as head of the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) last May 20, his efforts to halt the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant failed to receive the necessary support from officials at higher levels.

The GCAA's Lai said that anti-nuclear activists are terribly disappointed that the DPP-led government has not even tried to review out-of-date energy policies.

"It's ironic that the DPP-led government has apparently forgotten the experts who wrote such an innovative environmental white paper for Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) during the presidential election," Lai said.

Anti-nuclear activists complain that the type of thinking that drives the present DPP-led government is nearly identical to that of the former KMT regime.

To facilitate the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, Taiwan Power Company (Taipower, 台電) is currently trying to placate opposition by offering better compensation to fishermen in Kungliao (貢寮) township, Taipei County, where the plant lies.

Environmentalists say that Taipower's strategy in Kungliao was exactly the one used by the former KMT-led government to compensate fishermen in Tamsui (淡水) a decade ago, when the central government planned to build Tamhai New Town (淡海新市鎮), a huge residential community, by the estuary of the Tamsui River.

The project for creating the new town was designed to satisfy home-buyers in a hungry real-estate market. The ambitious project, however, turned out to be a failure because of the bad quality of the living environment and the lack of infrastructure. Surplus residential units still lie abandoned there and the government is continuing to pay off loans related to the project.

The failure of the Tamhai development plan resulted in the censure of several Cabinet agencies by the Control Yuan on May 1 for the unnecessary waste of money and the destruction of land. Activists believe that the damaged coastal environment in Tamsui might never recover and that the local fishing industry is damaged beyond repair.

"The huge Fourth Nuclear Power Plant project is exactly like the Tamhai case because both are impractical and both are inappropriate," Lai said.

"Does Taiwan have to walk down the same mistaken path again?" Lai said.

Environmentalists believe that the government has repeatedly failed to do the environmental footwork required to assure both long-term economic growth and a safe, secure environment for the country.

"From the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant to the Pinnan Industrial Complex Project, the government has unfortunately allowed short-term political concerns to outweigh the nation's long-term interests in environmental protection," said Lin Tze-luen (林子倫), a research associate at the Center for Energy and Environmental Policy at the University of Delaware in the US.

Last September, Lin and US experts from the Alton W. Jones Foundation held an international conference in Taipei on renewable energy.

In the same week, energy experts from Germany held another international conference on renewable energy in Taipei. At the opening ceremony, Chen promised to adopt more renewable energy sources in Taiwan, saying that the Presidential Office would be run on solar power. However, Chen has thus far failed to keep his word.

"The economic concerns of narrow sets of special interests continue to take precedence over the interests of the vast majority of the public," Lin said.

Environmentalists say that if the government had kept environmental concerns clearly in mind then a number of recent disasters could have been averted.

"Over the past year, the DPP-led government has experienced several crises, which actually resulted from perfunctory environmental impact assessments (EIA)," said Lin Sheng-chung (林聖崇), head of Taiwan Greenpeace.

Lin said that the recent fight between the National Science Council (NSC) and the Ministry of Transportation and Communications over vibration problems caused by a high-speed railroad passing by the Tainan Science-based Industrial Park could be attributed to the conditionally approved EIA for the industrial park. The EIA report lacked a precise limit for the intensity of vibrations produced by trains using the line.

The replacement of the NSC chairman in March was partly due to the agency's failure to prevent high-tech firms from pulling their projects out of the park.

Last July, Lin said, former vice premier Yu Shyi-kun's resignation in the wake of the Pachang Creek (八掌溪) tragedy resulted indirectly from a questionable EIA.

Lin argues that if the assessment had been done properly, a gravel excavation project would not have been permitted upstream of the creek. Poor land preservation in mountain areas caused the flood, which claimed the lives of four hapless workers killed while clinging to one another in the rising water.

Environmentalists charge that the DPP-led government has failed to come up with strategies to solve a number of existing problems, such as the illegal dumping of hazardous industrial waste.

In early July of last year, the illegal dumping of toxic chemical solvents upstream in the Kaoping River (高屏溪) caused serious water pollution, leaving millions of residents without tap water for days.

Twenty-two people from the Eternal Chemical Company (長興化工) and Shengli (昇利) waste handlers were indicted last August for their roles in the crime; 12 have been charged with attempted homicide and prosecutors have requested that five be given life sentences. In addition, the prosecutor requested that Eternal be fined NT$260 million and Shengli NT$160 million.

New EPA head Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), who took over after Lin Jun-yi stepped down in March due to the poor handling of an oil spill in Kenting in January, vowed in March that a final repository for hazardous waste would be built within one and a half years.
This story has been viewed 2662 times.