A public opinion survey released yesterday showed that Taiwanese are more opposed to the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s (新北市) Gongliao District (貢寮) than the use of nuclear energy in general, with nearly 60 percent of respondents saying they opposed completing the construction of the plant and 50 percent saying they were against nuclear power.
The survey was conducted by Taiwan Indicator Survey Research between Wednesday and Thursday last week, and focused on nuclear issues. The poll followed nationwide anti-nuclear demonstrations that drew 200,000 participants over the weekend and was released yesterday on the second anniversary of the meltdown at Japan’s Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in 2011.
When asked about Taiwan’s use of nuclear energy, the poll found that 52.5 percent of respondents did not disapprove of keeping the three nuclear power plants currently in operation running, but did not want any new plants to be built, with 18.5 percent saying that all nuclear power plants should be shut down, 12 percent supporting the construction of new plants and 17 percent saying they had no opinion on the matter.
Half of those polled said they disapproved of using nuclear power as a source of energy, with 29 percent expressing “strong disapproval,” compared with the 34.3 percent of respondents who were in favor of nuclear power and 15.7 percent who said they were undecided.
When asked about continuing the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, 58 percent of respondents said construction should be stopped, while 25.1 percent said the project should be completed and 16.9 percent abstained from answering.
A breakdown of the poll results found that more than half of the 58 percent of those surveyed who supported suspending construction of the plant — which represented 34.7 percent of all respondents — advocated permanently stopping construction.
Meanwhile, 16.8 percent of respondents favored a temporary suspension and making the final decision after a safety check is carried out, with 6.5 percent agreeing that the project should be temporarily stalled, but that a national referendum should decide the matter.
The majority of the 25.1 percent of those polled who favored completing the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant — 23.1 percent — said the plant should operate after it is finished, with the remaining 2 percent saying it should not be made operational after it is built.
The results showed that the public is more skeptical about the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant specifically, than nuclear energy in general, Taiwan Indicator Survey Research general manager Tai Li-an (戴立安) said, adding that the survey seemed to suggest that opposition to the project and nuclear energy were viewed as two separate issues by many people.
The survey collected 1,007 valid samples and had a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS