A prominent activist said yesterday the momentum of the environmental movement in Taiwan has reached a new high.
“We have finally arrived at the watershed moment where the fairy tale of nuclear safety is being seriously challenged,” Green Party Taiwan spokesman Pan Han-shen (潘翰聲) said.
The 41-year-old has participated in hundreds of peaceful demonstrations throughout his career, calling on grassroot movements to tackle issues ranging from blocking local petrochemical development to promoting wetlands conservation.
For the past five years, Pan has served as a leading figure of the nation’s only internationally affiliated political party, representing the Green Party Taiwan three times in legislative and city council races. The party has 300 registered members and often advocates for social causes.
The party has not been able to gain a foothold in any government body because it usually gets drowned out by heavy campaigning from the major political parties. However, its positions are considered an alternative viewpoint on public issues.
At a demonstration in front of the Executive Yuan on Thursday, Pan urged the government to focus on creating more renewable energy generation instead of relying on nuclear power, pointing out that the scope of the crisis in Japan offered Taiwanese an opportunity to rethink the consequences of Taiwan’s reliance on nuclear power.
Pan also thinks the government needs to take a more practical approach to its energy policy. He said industrial power consumption in Taiwan accounts for 80 percent of total electricity usage. The nation should reduce the scale of four of its most energy-intensive industries: paper-making, cement, steel and petrochemicals, Pan said.
“Taiwan needs a fundamental change in its industrial structure by shifting away from traditional labor-intensive economy toward one that pursues quality and skill,” he said.
The Bureau of Energy said the nation consumed 27.4 billion kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity last year, with nuclear power providing 16 percent of that number.
“I don’t see why we cannot reduce that proportion of [nuclear] supply by providing better incentives and management,” he said.
An efficient way to cut back industrial demand for electricity, Pan said, would be to expose industries to the real cost of electricity by using market incentives.
“Simply put, electricity in Taiwan is too cheap,” he said.
Pan said the government should limit the industrial use of power by levying a tax on electricity.
Data from the state-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) from last year showed the average price of electricity for industry was NT$2.35 per kWh, which was the fifth-lowest among 30 members and observers of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.
As for electricity management, Pan said that in order to reduce waste, Taipower must practice better load balancing — the practice of storing excess electrical power during periods of low demand that are released when demand rises.
By using modern electrical network technology, such as a smart grid which uses digital technology to manage the transport of electricity from its source to its users as demand fluctuates, Taiwan could raise the efficiency of its power usage by 4 percent and reduce power consumption to less than last year’s level by 2025.
Pan also asked the public to think critically about the issue of nuclear power and not just fall squarely on pro or anti-nuclear sides. He said that political parties would often push stereotypical positions for their own political interests.
However, he does think the younger generation has the advantage of being better informed and carrying less of a political burden than their parents’ generation.
“In the past, many incorrect decisions were made because people had limited knowledge of Mother Earth, as well as of the way politics works,” he said. “Seeing what has happened in Japan, it’s certainly time for people to rise up and make a change.”
See EDITORIAL on page 8
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
More than 6,000 Taiwanese students have participated in exchange programs in China over the past two years, despite the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) “orange light” travel advisory, government records showed. The MAC’s publicly available registry showed that Taiwanese college and university students who went on exchange programs across the Strait numbered 3,592 and 2,966 people respectively. The National Immigration Agency data revealed that 2,296 and 2,551 Chinese students visited Taiwan for study in the same two years. A review of the Web sites of publicly-run universities and colleges showed that Taiwanese higher education institutions continued to recruit students for Chinese educational programs without
China has reserved offshore airspace over the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts that are usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on Sunday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. The alerts, known as notice to air missions (NOTAMs), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert
RSS