"For example, Taiwan has great potential to develop the technology for manufacturing fuel cells or solar panels," Byrne said.
He said that China had been aware of the advantages of adopting renewable energy and that the market there was still growing.
"In addition to the market, the reason for other countries keeping their eyes on China is because its attitude toward energy makes a great impact on the global environment," Byrne said.
Along the east coast of China, Byrne said, several wind turbines had been built by foreign investors. In Inner Mongolia and other rural areas, he said, mobile, small-sized power generators powered by renewable energy had been welcomed.
"A positive outcome of China's adoption of renewable energy, we can't deny, is that the amount of emissions of carbon dioxide in China has been decreasing since 1995," said Byrne.
According to research in 1999 by the US-based Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, coal accounts for three quarters of China's energy supply. It is the burning of coal in China that causes the emission of carbon dioxide, which is also responsible for acid rain affecting neighboring countries, including Taiwan.
"In terms of scale, Taiwan is not going to affect the global environment too much. But it can be a leader in this region if the [renewable energy] technology transfer works," Byrne said.
"I do think Taiwan's energy policy can be changed but the leadership has to focus now on new directions," Byrne said.
To break the stalemate, he said, the government should take the foreign experience on renewable energy seriously.
"I hope that the conference is a beginning of heading for the new direction because many government agencies get involved," Byrne said.
At the conference, legislators, officials from the Energy Commission, the Environmental Protection Administration, the National Science Council, Taiwan Power, and others will get a chance to communicate with foreign energy experts from the UK, Germany, the US, and Japan.
For Taiwan, Byrne said, there are several ways to begin to transform energy policy. Promoting energy conservation and efficiency, setting a time-frame to allow renewable energy to take a certain percentage of energy supply, setting a good example by using a certain percentage of renewable energy in both public buildings and university campuses, and promoting the liberalization of the power industry are all practical, Byrne said.
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