Sun, Jul 10, 2011 page8

• The nuclear issue must be faced by candidates

  • By Huang Juei-min 黃瑞明
  • • 
    • 
    • 

  On June 30, the German parliament passed a series of bills to decommission all Germany’s nuclear power plants by 2022. The decision was a result of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant crisis, which terrified Germans 9,000km away.

  In 2000, Germany’s coalition government set a goal for a gradual nuclear phase-out, but where would energy come from after the phase-out was completed?

  Complementary measures required that alternative energy sources, such as wind, sunlight, moving water, terrestrial heat and marsh gas, increase from 8 percent to 12.5 percent of the energy supply by late last year. Surprisingly, statistics show that the portion supplied by alternative energy sources now makes up 17 percent.

  The Japanese will long be haunted by the Fukushima crisis. Japan has 54 nuclear power plants and Germany has 17. After the March 11 earthquake, the Japanese government temporarily halted the operations of 35 of them, seriously affecting the nation’s power supply. However, the latest opinion polls show that 69 percent of Japanese hope the plants will be permanently decommissioned. The reason is simple: Radioactive dust is scarier than anything else.

  The Japanese have paid a heavy price. The Germans are smart enough to learn from others’ misfortunes. So what about Taiwanese?

  Building a “nuclear-free homeland” was once an internal Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) consensus. Soon after Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) became president in 2000, then-premier Chang Chun--hsiung’s (張俊雄) Cabinet announced that it would scrap the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in Gongliao District (貢寮), New Taipei City (新北市), but its legislative minority forced it to resume the project the following year.

  However, the DPP was still in charge of considerable administrative resources and could have increased the proportion of renewable energy sources — a necessary move for any party abandoning nuclear power. Regrettably, eight years later, renewable energy sources made up only 1 percent of the nation’s energy supply. And, after three years of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration, the figure remains unchanged.

  Germany seized the opportunity to demonstrate the feasibility of alternative energy generation. Taiwan, however, has lost precious time and the public remains obsessed with the idea that we cannot live without nuclear power. As the news about Fukushima fades, the nuclear issue is forgotten. In an interview in May with the Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun, Ma said that 99.4 percent of Taiwan’s energy supply is imported and Taiwan is vulnerable because this energy is mostly imported from non-diplomatic allies. He also said that since green energy is not sufficiently developed, Taiwan cannot currently abolish nuclear power. That is true, but how are we going to develop green energy if both the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the DPP pay so little attention to the energy transformation issue?

  The use of renewable energy sources is not a high-tech marvel — China is the world’s largest user of wind power and the world’s largest manufacturer of solar panels. Taiwan’s problem is one of attitude: We have become dependent on nuclear energy and cannot kick the habit. We do not want to think about what a magnitude 9 earthquake might do, or the risk that something could go wrong at the nuclear waste storage facility on Orchid Island.

  In April, Time magazine asked Chernobyl director Ihor Gramotkin how long it would be before the site would again become habitable. He replied: “At least 20,000 years.”

  Taiwanese should push the presidential candidates to clarify their stance on the energy issue.

  Huang Juei-ming is a law professor at Providence University.

  TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG
• Most Popular

  • 1

    Palmeiras hopes for club cup win

  • 2

    Magnitude 6.4 earthquake hits Hualien County

  • 3

    Taiwan to see nine extended holidays in 2026

  • 4

    Hegseth outlines Chinese threat

  • 5

    Pegatron ranks last in Greenpeace report