Since the nuclear disaster at Fukushima’s Dai-ichi power plant in March, several countries have turned their backs on the energy source. Italy kissed nuclear power goodbye with a June referendum that passed only days after Germany decided to scrap nuclear power by 2022. But is phasing it out a realistic policy for Taiwan?
The German Institute Taipei aims to provoke public discussion on nuclear power and other green issues such as energy use, environmental protection and economic development with Team Sustainability, an initiative begun last fall.
“Our idea is to bring sustainability more into the political debate by offering people in Taiwan a closer look at what is happening in Germany,” said Mirko Kruppa, deputy director-general of the German Institute, Taipei, and the project’s coordinator.
Photo courtesy of the German Institute Taipei
To facilitate dialogue between Germany and Taiwan and to promote sustainable development, the German Institute has teamed up with the Taiwan Institute for Sustainable Energy (台灣永續能源研究基金會, TISE) to take the message to cities throughout Taiwan in November. Their Sustainability Roadshow seeks to bring members of the public, NGOs, universities, and political and business leaders together to discuss ways of developing environmentally sustainable practices.
Team Sustainability was established after the German government released a policy paper titled Energy Concept for an Environmentally Sound, Reliable and Affordable Energy Supply in September last year. The paper sets long-term goals that aim to see Germany become one of the most energy efficient and green economies in the world.
Kruppa will deliver a public lecture titled How Green is Germany? next Saturday for the Lung Yingtai Cultural Foundation (龍應台文化基金會) as part of its Taipei Salon (台北沙龍) lectures series.
Photo courtesy of the German Institute, Taipei
“In Germany, sustainability is driven by the home market,” Kruppa said. “We have fairly high energy prices, we have regulation standards that have to be met, and the German government is trying to create a positive business environment to trigger these green innovations. In the end it is also resource and energy saving policies that are behind the idea.”
In an interview with the Taipei Times, Kruppa discussed three key areas that Taiwan could focus on to improve sustainability: the country’s energy sources, energy efficiency and the development of a consensus on the use of energy that is bipartisan.
Taipei Times: How are sustainability issues being discussed in Germany and, in your opinion, are they being debated in Taiwan?
Mirko Kruppa: Taiwanese are debating these issues, particularly on the research level. In Germany, we have realized that if you really want to move these things along it takes a very long-term oriented commitment — how we organize ourselves in view of the limited resources in the future.
We call this zukunft angst, or “future angst.” Germans are very afraid of the future and have a tendency to look very far into the future. People put pressure on their politicians. They say, “How will you make sure our planet is safe for our children?”
In countries where you don’t have that time perspective — politicians who operate on a four-year perspective in other democracies — might not dare engage in policies that shall emerge two or three legislative periods later. Or, as in the case of Germany’s energy concept, 10 legislative periods later. In many countries putting it into these political terms is illogical.
These are the kinds of ideas we want to bring into the discussion here in Taiwan. It’s like a cocktail. We put in some German extract. We don’t know how it will taste afterwards. Hopefully better, definitely more interesting [laughs].
TT: Has there been a positive response in Taiwan to this German extract? Is there a political will to address sustainability?
MK: It depends where you put the straw. If it’s in the research cocktail, then it’s good. You have a very tasty mix of experts who know what they are dealing with — what is good for Taiwan and what might not work. So that cocktail is very interesting to drink.
If you look to the media cocktail or the laobaixing (老百姓, or common person) cocktail, it’s pale. These issues are not being debated. It’s not brought up as an issue that might affect Taiwan’s future, that these long-term trends need long-term answers and policies that voters need to ask the politicians to deal with.
TT: And that’s because these issues aren’t being debated in the media?
MK: Or the other way around. The laobaixing isn’t interested so you don’t debate it in the media. It’s self-enforcing. But that’s the idea of the Sustainability Roadshow.
TT: You’ve mentioned the year 2050 as the target date to implement these long-term goals and short-term structural changes. How might that play out in Taiwan?
MK: It’s already working in two directions. The first is the infrastructure problem. People can see it every day at home with their water. Water is very cheap here, but the water drainage system is fading. You can’t keep up the pressure you need for safe water and for clean water so there is a lot of chlorine in the water here and you can’t use your tap water for drinking. So if you take a long-term approach, people will have to think, “Well wait a minute, the infrastructure is decaying so we will have to invest at a certain point.” But where should the money come from if today’s utility costs for water are not even meeting the costs to keep it maintained, not renewed but just maintained? This will eventually hit a wall. When, nobody knows. But it will happen.
The same thing with energy. Taipower [Taiwan Power Co (台灣電力公司), Taiwan’s state-owned electric utility] is running losses, which are covered by the taxpayer. So if you are a taxpayer in Taiwan, your electricity bill is actually higher. It can work, but it doesn’t seem sustainable … This whole thing is very deeply rooted in the society here and difficult to change.
You need political debate on it. You need politicians to have a vision, ideally bipartisan, and develop a policy for investors who can make long-term investment decisions and at the same time calibrate it socially so that people can handle the change.
TT: Could the money spent on building the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant be better spent, for example, on renewable energies such as solar or wind power?
MK: First, not all these renewable energies are sustainable. For example, solar power in Germany is not a good choice. In fact it’s one of the worst countries for solar power because there isn’t enough sunlight. Germany here is running in the wrong direction.
The issue is different. Every country has to define its own energy mix. What in one country might be reasonable will not definitely be reasonable in another country. The best example is Norway, which is 80 percent on renewable energies. How do they do this? Waterpower. They have perfect conditions for hydropower.
Solar energy works better in Taiwan than it does in Germany. Solar energy capacity here is four times as high as the best locations in Germany. There is offshore wind here, which has potential as well. There are a lot of question marks though as to which energy mix is the right one. How do you do it? There isn’t anyone who could say right now with a full heart it’s with or without nuclear energy.
TT: What do you think Taiwan’s energy mix should be?
MK: There is a lot of research going on. For me, it is very hard to evaluate this research because from what I’ve seen and know it differs a lot. And as always with research projects, you have to look at who ordered them. You don’t have a lot of transparency here, which makes the energy mix difficult to evaluate. In the end it comes down to the concept of the energy market in Taiwan.
So first of all, do you want to have a free energy market with competing energy producers as we have in Germany, which is triggering a lot of the change? And a renewable energy future must be decentralized — a windmill or solar roof somewhere — so it makes sense to have the market structures to bring that in.
At the same time if you look at a decentralized energy system, you might come to different conclusions for your energy mix potential than if you are still stuck in the structure of centralized power plant production, which is always there as a constant supply when demand is changing around it day and night. And now comes the big second part, without which this whole structure cannot work: If you don’t work on energy efficiency you’ll get nowhere.
TT: How does Taiwan’s energy efficiency compare with Germany’s?
MK: If Taiwan were as energy efficient as Germany — that is in housing, the insulation in the housing, the efficiency degree/low usage of energy in Germany’s factories and machines, energy usage at home — it could do without its three existing nuclear power plants. Worldwide, 40 percent of energy consumption today comes from housing and this is fairly standard from country to country. A renewable energy future, no matter how the concrete mix of it looks, needs energy efficiency. And this is the big task; this is where the bigger part of the investment goes: How do we make our societies energy efficient?
Today there are the technology and the materials to make housing not only zero energy consuming but with smart buildings you can have power-plus houses that contribute as a decentralized energy source. But that takes time. It takes the right incentives. You need investment programs. You need standards that you might have to force developers to apply, which Germany is doing in many areas. It takes huge decisions and this comes back to the political consensus with respect to the investment side.
For example, the red-green coalition government in Germany introduced an “ecotax” on petrol [beginning in 1998], which saw prices increase every half year for a period of eight years. In this way, people were able to anticipate the price increase of petrol over this period. That helped them to make investment decisions, look more at efficient technologies while lowering their petrol consumption. At the same time the money was used not only to re-invest in renewable energy, but also to lower social security costs. So here was a social component linked to an environmental component.
This shows that with smart politics and a consensus within society on these issues you can find ways to, on the one hand, trigger investment and get the efficiency done, and at the same time try to balance it socially. Which again is a mix that every country has to find for itself.
This interview has been condensed and edited.
● For more information about Team Sustainability and the Sustainability Roadshow, visit www.taipei.diplo.de/Vertretung/taipei/en/Sustainability/Nachhaltigkeit.html
● How Green is Germany? will be held next Saturday from 2pm to 4pm at Yue-han Hall (月涵堂), 110 Jinhua St, Taipei City (台北市金華街110號). The lecture will be conducted in English only. Admission is free, but those attending must pre-register online at www.civictaipei.org or by calling (02) 3322-4907
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