The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) yesterday dismissed reports that the government is planning to replace the third liquified natural gas (LNG) terminal project in Taoyuan with an LNG terminal in Yunlin County’s Mailiao Township (麥寮).
The Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday cited “senior MOEA staff” as saying that President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) had asked Formosa Plastics Group (FPG, 台塑集團) chairman William Wong (王文淵) if the construction of an LNG terminal in Mailiao could be sped up.
The environmental group Air Clean Taiwan also held a press conference yesterday at the Legislative Yuan calling for the swift construction of an LNG terminal in Mailiao to “save the algal reefs and the health of all Taiwanese.”
Photo: Cheng Shu-ting, Taipei Times
Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua (王美花) said that it is “impossible” for an LNG terminal in Mailiao to replace the proposed third LNG terminal off the coast of Datan Borough (大潭) in Taoyuan’s Guanyin District (觀音).
“Without an environmental impact assessment or agreement from local authorities, an LNG terminal at Mailiao is at least six years away,” Wang said.
“Mailiao is also 180km from the Datan Power Plant where the gas is needed. From previous experience, we know that those pipelines take a long time to build,” she said.
Photo: CNA
Wang said the ministry would “heartily approve” the construction of an LNG power plant and receiving terminal at Mailiao, not to replace the third LNG terminal, but to replace coal-fired plants, which release far more pollutants into the air.
“If we can build an LNG power plant in Mailiao and replace existing coal-fired plants, that would help greatly in our goal of reducing the use of coal and air pollution,” Wang said. “We will be happy to assist FPG in such a project.”
The planned third LNG terminal became controversial after environmental groups started a petition for a referendum blocking its construction in order to protect “algal reefs that are more than 7,500 years old” off Datan.
Taiwanese voters will go to the polls on Aug. 28 to decide the fate of the third LNG terminal. There are to be three other referendums on the ballot, including one calling for the mothballed Fourth Nuclear Power Plant to be activated.
According to the Referendum Act (公民投票法), 25 percent of registered voters must vote “yes” to a proposal, with the “yes” votes outnumbering the “no” votes for the proposal to pass.
Shares of contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) came under pressure yesterday after a report that Apple Inc is looking to shift some orders from the Taiwanese company to Intel Corp. TSMC shares fell NT$55, or 2.4 percent, to close at NT$2,235 on the local main board, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed. Despite the losses, TSMC is expected to continue to benefit from sound fundamentals, as it maintains a lead over its peers in high-end process development, analysts said. “The selling was a knee-jerk reaction to an Intel-Apple report over the weekend,” Mega International Investment Services Corp (兆豐國際投顧) analyst Alex Huang
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is expected to remain Apple Inc’s primary chip manufacturing partner despite reports that Apple could shift some orders to Intel Corp, industry experts said yesterday. The comments came after The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Apple and Intel had reached a preliminary agreement following more than a year of negotiations for Intel to manufacture some chips for Apple devices. Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (台灣經濟研究院) economist Arisa Liu (劉佩真) said TSMC’s advanced packaging technologies, including integrated fan-out and chip-on-wafer-on-substrate, remain critical to the performance of Apple’s A-series and M-series chips. She said Intel and Samsung
POWER BUILDUP: Powered by Nvidia’s B200 Blackwell chips, the data center would support MediaTek’s computing power demand and business growth, the company said Smartphone chip designer MediaTek Inc (聯發科) yesterday launched a new artificial intelligence (AI) data center with a maximum capacity of 45 megawatts to meet its rising demand for computing power required to develop new advanced chips for AI applications. The company has completed the first-phase computing power buildup at the data center in Miaoli County’s Tongluo Township (銅鑼), providing 15 megawatts of capacity to support its research and development (R&D) capabilities, despite an industrywide shortage of key components, MediaTek said. Supply constraints have plagued a wide range of key components, including memory chips, solid-state drives, power supply units and central
TRANSITION: With the closure, the company would reorganize its Taiwanese unit to a sales and service-focused model, Bridgestone said Bridgestone Corp yesterday announced it would cease manufacturing operations at its tire plant in Hsinchu County’s Hukou Township (湖口), affecting more than 500 workers. Bridgestone Taiwan Co (台灣普利司通) said in a statement that the decision was based on the Tokyo-based tire maker’s adjustments to its global operational strategy and long-term market development considerations. The Taiwanese unit would be reorganized as part of the closure, effective yesterday, and all related production activities would be concluded, the statement said. Under the plan, Bridgestone would continue to deepen its presence in the Taiwanese market, while transitioning to a sales and service-focused business model, it added. The Hsinchu
RSS