The government may have to deal with more water shortages as Taiwan’s climate has become “bipolar,” academics said yesterday.
Chou Chia (周佳), a research fellow at Academia Sinica, said that as global warming alters climate patterns, people can expect more rain in the rainy season and less during the dry season.
“In the areas of Asia affected by the monsoon, which include Taiwan, the weather has become bipolar,” Chou said. “The phenomenon has become more obvious in central and southern parts of the country, including Yunlin, Chiayi and Tainan counties.”
The news came two days after the Water Resources Agency announced a plan to further restrict water usage at swimming pools and other locations in central Taiwan if the water situation does not improve by the end of next month.
Chou said annual rainfall had not changed much in the past 30 years, with the nation receiving an average of 2,600mm. However, the distribution of rainfall was uneven. While severe rainfall led to floods in some areas, others were hit by drought.
Rainfall intensity is estimated to increase about 15 percent in the rainy season by the end of the century, but the chances of droughts were also higher, he said. The Greater Kaohsiung area, for example, would not have received even half the normal annual rainfall for 2009 had it not been for the torrential rain brought by Typhoon Morakot.
ALIGNED THINKING: Taiwan and Japan have a mutual interest in trade, culture and engineering, and can work together for stability, Cho Jung-tai said Taiwan and Japan are two like-minded countries willing to work together to form a “safety barrier” in the Indo-Pacific region, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said at the opening ceremony of the 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium in Taipei. Taiwan and Japan are close geographically and closer emotionally, he added. Citing the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪) in September, Cho said the submersible water level sensors given by Japan during the disaster helped Taiwan monitor the lake’s water levels more accurately. Japan also provided a lot of vaccines early in the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic,
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
TEMPORAL/SPIRITUAL: Beijing’s claim that the next Buddhist leader must come from China is a heavy-handed political maneuver that will fall flat-faced, experts said China’s requirement that the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation to be born in China and approved by Beijing has drawn criticism, with experts at a forum in Taipei yesterday saying that if Beijing were to put forth its own Dalai Lama, the person would not be recognized by the Tibetan Buddhist community. The experts made a remarks at the two-day forum hosted by the Tibet Religious Foundation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama titled: “The Snow Land Forum: Finding Common Ground on Tibet.” China says it has the right to determine the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation, as it claims sovereignty over Tibet since ancient times,
Temperatures in some parts of Taiwan are expected to fall sharply to lows of 15°C later this week as seasonal northeasterly winds strengthen, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. It is to be the strongest cold wave to affect northern Taiwan this autumn, while Chiayi County in the southwest and some parts of central Taiwan are likely to also see lower temperatures due to radiational cooling, which occurs under conditions of clear skies, light winds and dry weather, the CWA said. Across Taiwan, temperatures are to fall gradually this week, dropping to 15°C to 16°C in the early hours of Wednesday
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