Democratic Progressive Party New Taipei City mayoral candidate Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) yesterday established his campaign headquarters in Rueifang District (瑞芳), but was criticized by opponents of the proposed Shenao Power Plant (深澳電廠), who said he ignored their requests.
Su touted his achievements, such as building the Gold Museum and alleviating the district’s flooding problem, during his time as Taipei county commissioner from 1997 to 2004.
Su said that if elected, he would promote smart transportation, establish offices for local borough wardens, boost the facilities of garbage collectors, reduce garbage disposal fees and subsidize dentures for elderly people, but did not mention the power plant.
Photo: Lin Hsin-han, Taipei Times
State-run Taiwan Power Co has proposed building the coal-fired plant in the district. It is expected to start operations in 2025.
When Anti-Shenao Plant Self-Help Group director Chen Chih-chiang (陳志強), also the district’s Longshan Borough (龍山) warden, tried to express locals opposition to the plant, Su responded by only saying: “Thank you,” without stopping to listen to their plea, Chen said.
Chen said he tried to give Su a report about the plant’s potential effects on human health released earlier this month by Greenpeace Taiwan, but added that Su only took the report, and patted his shoulder and stomach before leaving.
He and other group members were startled and upset by Su’s behavior, Chen said.
Greenpeace Taiwan members, who were at the event to support the group, urged candidates to make “reducing coal burning and promoting renewable energy” part of their policy platforms.
Once the power plant starts operations, neighboring municipalities would be affected by its PM2.5 emissions — fine particulate matter measuring 2.5 micrometers in diameter or smaller — as the annual average PM2.5 concentrations in the seven municipalities in northern Taiwan would increase by up to 0.28 micrograms per cubic meter, the report showed.
If the plant operates from 2025 to 2040, it might cause 576 deaths, nearly a quarter of which are early deaths before 70 years old, with most related to stroke, cardiovascular or lung diseases, the report said.
Su’s campaign spokesperson Huang Wei-chun (黃韋鈞) was yesterday quoted by the Chinese-language United Daily News as saying that Su patted Chen on his shoulder to encourage him to keep working for the cause, adding that Su did not have other physical contact with Chen as the latter has claimed.
Su’s stance on the power plant has been clear, which is that the city’s economic development needs electricity, but he would oppose any plant that is unsafe and causes pollution, Huang added.
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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