The Environmental Protection Administration’s (EPA) environmental impact assessment (EIA) panel yesterday rejected CPC Corp, Taiwan’s (CPC) renewal plan for its third naphtha cracker in Kaohsiung County’s Linyuan Township (林園).
The decision means the CPC proposal will go back to a case committee review.
The EIA panel said if the company wished to move ahead with its NT$46 billion (US$1.4 billion) construction plan, it would need to go through the EIA process with a new case committee.
When construction proposals are filed to the EPA, they are first reviewed by a EIA case committee, which consists of around seven of the 21 EIA panel members, before they can go before the entire EIA panel.
Several local residents opposed to the naptha cracker project who were demonstrating in front of the EPA yesterday fell to their knees crying when they were told of the ruling, saying that the EIA panel had made an informed decision.
However, former Linyuan anti-naphtha cracker association chairman Wu Chi-hung (伍啟宏) said, “[The residents] are tired.”
“CPC will not leave us alone — this is the fourth time we have fought against them during case committee reviews,” Wu said.
“Though CPC calls it a ‘renewal plan,’ the proposal is actually to increase productivity of the plant four-fold — from 230,000 tons of polystyrene to up to 800,000,” he said.
At stake, Wu said, was the residents’ health.
“Those of you in the north should make a trip down south and see it for yourself — we are not living in an inhabitable area,” he said.
“The air smells awful, we have to buy drinking water and our cancer rate is four times the national average,” he said.
Wu said residents would “fight until the end” if the CPC refiles the case, adding: “We have lived with the plant next to our home for some 30 years, we are not throwing a temper tantrum, we are battling for the well-being of our neighborhood.”
Former EIA panelist Li Ken-cheng (李根政), who spoke against the expansion plan, said the panel listened to the local residents and made a professional and sensible decision.
However, Green Party Taiwan (GPT) secretary-general Pan Han-sheng (潘翰聲) said yesterday’s decision was “the second best option we would have chosen.”
“Anyone would agree this is a major construction case — and as such the case should enter the more elaborate and stringent second stage EIA review [which means more requirements need to be met], instead of kicking the case back and forth between the case committee and the panel,” he said.
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
AMENDMENT: Contact with certain individuals in China, Hong Kong and Macau must be reported, and failure to comply could result in a prison sentence, the proposal stated The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) yesterday voted against a proposed bill by Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers that would require elected officials to seek approval before visiting China. DPP Legislator Puma Shen’s (沈伯洋) proposed amendments to the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), stipulate that contact with certain individuals in China, Hong Kong and Macau should be reported, while failure to comply would be punishable by prison sentences of up to three years, alongside a fine of NT$10 million (US$309,041). Fifty-six voted with the TPP in opposition
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai