State-owned oil refiner CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) and its contractor yesterday pointed fingers at each other for causing a massive blackout on Tuesday.
At a news conference yesterday, CPC chairman Derek Chen (陳金德) blamed the incident on Lumax International Corp (巨路), which was hired to replace power supply system components at a natural gas power plant in Taoyuan’s Datan Township (大潭).
Lumax engineers were to replace two supply components in a CPC metering station control room near the Datan Natural Gas Power Plant, Chen said.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
However, neither they nor CPC staff switched the control system from automatic to manual while replacing the components, Chen added
Chen said their failure to follow standard operating procedures caused the system to automatically close two valves, shutting off gas supplies to six generators at the power plant late on Tuesday afternoon.
The human error caused a massive blackout that affected more than 6.68 million users, half of Taiwan’s 13 million users, state-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) said.
“They all failed to execute their duties based on the rules,” Chen said.
Chen said that before the latest replacement, seven other components had been replaced and “not once was the system switched to manual mode.”
An initial investigation showed similar procedural neglect has existed for a long time, Chen said.
CPC departments have similar problems, he added.
Lumax rejected the accusation, saying that its staff were only assisting CPC workers in replacing the components.
The contract between the companies is limited to the procurement of components used in power supply, Lumax said in a statement.
Lumax — which has collaborated with CPC for more than 10 years — said responsibility still needs to be clarified.
Chen said he would “take complete responsibility” for the power outage and CPC would discipline the personnel found to be at fault in a week.
He did not confirm if he is to resign from his position.
Asked about compensation to reimburse households affected by the blackout, Chen said that CPC is still working with Taipower to calculate losses.
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