The Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) plans to propose amendments to the Environmental Impact Assessment Act (環境影響評估法) within one year, EPA Deputy Minister Thomas Chan (詹順貴) said yesterday, a move that has long been expected to close loopholes in the legislation and improve environmental protection.
EPA officials yesterday met with environmentalists to listen to their opinions about the long-awaited amendment, with transparency, public participation and measures to suspend controversial and ongoing developments at the center of discussions.
“The most important thing I am tasked with is to overhaul the environmental impact assessment [EIA] system and reduce air pollution,” Chan said. “I plan to put forward draft amendments to the Environmental Impact Assessment Act in nine months.”
The new EIA system would likely alter the role of environmental consulting firms, which help developers draft EIA reports for review, making them work for the EPA’s Environmental Impact Assessment Committee to formulate reports and conduct environmental monitoring in ways that are tailored to individual cases, Chan said.
Environmental Jurists Association lawyer Chang Yu-yin (張譽尹) said he supported the proposed move, adding that EIAs are often stalled due to miscommunication between consulting firms and the EIA committee, which usually results in incomplete collection of information.
“A new EIA system should be designed to evaluate government development projects, because the EPA always becomes powerless when reviewing government development, be it [former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九)] ‘12 Love Taiwan Construction Projects’ or nuclear power plants,” Chang said.
“Legal measures should be in place to halt ongoing construction projects whose environmental approval is being challenged, so there will be no more Miramar Resort Hotel, [of which some buildings were completed during years of legal battle between the developer and Taitung residents],” he said.
Wild at Heart Legal Defense Association secretary-general Hsieh Meng-yu (謝孟羽) said a majority of members of the EIA committee should not be affiliated with the government so that they can maintain impartiality.
“Under the existing EIA system, developers can voluntarily withdraw an application to avoid rejection and resubmit the application. The Asian Cement mining application [Hsinchu’s Guansi Township (關西)] is a good example. The new system should prevent developers from manipulating the EIA system,” Hsieh said.
A post-EIA review system should be in place to regularly inspect whether a development follows requirements stipulated by the EIA, or whether approved development is no longer suitable for the environment, Fight for Health Women’s Group executive director Yen Shu-nu (顏淑女) said.
Lawyer Tsai Ya-ying (蔡雅瀅) said EIA reviews should be streamed live online to promote more public participation.
The EPA will reassess the necessity of all government development projects, including the Taoyuan Aerotropolis project, and the EPA is not obliged to accept government projects, Chan said.
To improve public participation, the new EIA system would institutionalize resident-led field investigation prior to an EIA, so all potential problems of a development can be evaluated during the review.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching