The Ministry of Economic Affairs will improve the trade of renewable energy certificates by balancing supply and demand through reasonable pricing, and it plans to set up a trading platform by January next year, an official said yesterday.
The government has vowed to generate 20 percent of the nation’s electricity from renewable energy sources by 2025, when it also plans to phase out existing nuclear power generation facilities.
After amendments to the Renewable Energy Development Act (再生能源發展條例) were promulgated in May, big electricity users are required to ensure that certain ratios of their power supply come from renewable energy sources, Minister Without Portfolio Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫) told a forum on renewable energy in Taipei.
Photo: Lin Chia-nan, Taipei Times
Rising demand for renewable energy — either due to the act or corporate social responsibility — highlights the importance of renewable power certificates and their trading mechanism, he said, expressing the hope that the nation’s renewable energy trading market would become more active.
Sufficient supply of power from renewable energy sources, easy access and reasonable prices are key to boosting transactions in the renewable energy market, Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Lin Chuan-neng (林全能) said.
Having set clear goals in enhancing the ratio of renewable power sources, the bureau estimates that by next year, the installed capacity of renewable energy would reach 11.3 gigawatts, Lin said.
To facilitate renewable energy trade, the government established the National Renewable Energy Certification Center in April 2017, while the Bureau of Standards, Metrology and Inspection is planning to launch a certificate trading platform by Jan. 1 next year, he said.
As of yesterday, 59,973 certificates had been issued — 51,325 certificates for wind power, 8,560 for solar power and 88 for biomass power, but only 2,759 certificates have been sold, the center’s Web site showed.
Asked to comment on the wide gap between issued and sold certificates, Lin said that integration between the certificates and renewable power sources needs improvement.
The transactions would also be improved if there is a better pricing mechanism, he said, adding that the bureau and the center would further analyze the costs of different renewable energy sources.
Delivering a speech titled “Let the Sunshine In” at the forum, Google senior lead for energy and infrastructure Amanda Corio said that renewables have become more cost-effective and that energy storage projects are critically important to ensure stable power supply.
Taiwan still has higher costs of renewables than other places, she said, expressing the hope that the barrier would be removed.
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