State-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) is building a small-scale power grid in Penghu County’s Cimei Township (七美) to generate solar and wind power, with the aim of generating about 3.37 megawatts of electricity by 2019.
Solar and wind power can together supply the energy needs of outlying Penghu, where the wind is strongest in fall and winter and daylight hours are greatest in summer, said I-Shou University professor Chen Chao-shun (陳朝順), a member of the second phase of the National Energy Program.
While power generated from diesel fuel costs NT$16 (US$0.53) per kilowatt-hour (kWh), replacing it with “green” energy sources can save an estimated NT$53.92 million per year, he said, adding that carbon emissions can be reduced as well.
Photo provided by Taiwan Power Co
By 2019, up to 45 percent of the township’s electricity, particularly power consumed in nonpeak hours, is to be generated from renewable energy sources, he said.
Photovoltaic installations in the township could generate up to 1,200 kilowatts (kW) during peak power consumption by next year, increasing solar power generation in the county threefold over current levels, Taipower said.
By 2019, the capacity of wind power installations could amount to 600kW, while the power storage system for renewable energy is to be expanded to 2,000kWh.
As the efficiency of solar and wind power generation is susceptible to changes in weather, they can only become sources of baseload power when the problem of intermittent generation is resolved, Taipower spokesperson Lin Te-fu (林德福) said, adding that it is also essential to upgrade the energy storage system.
Lithium batteries cost US$600 per kilowatt-hour of electricity stored and can last for 10 years, Chen said.
Even if the cost is expected to be halved after 2020, it is too expensive for lithium batteries to be broadly used in Taiwan, he said, adding that this is why the battery is being tested on an outlying island first.
Penghu can demonstrate how low-carbon power generation works best so that the utility can spend money effectively, Taipower department of renewable energy director Chen I-cheng (陳一成) said.
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:
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