State-owned oil refiner CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) yesterday apologized for concealing an oil leak at its oil depot in Penghu, but said the situation has been brought under control.
CPC vice president Huang Jen-hung (黃仁弘) confirmed a report by the Chinese-language Apple Daily yesterday, saying that since the end of last year, 63m3 of gasoline gushing out of the Penghu depot has polluted nearly 0.8 hectares of land due to officials working at the oil depot failing to follow standard operating procedures.
However, CPC’s management team was unaware of the leak until they in May this year found a rusty steel plate at the bottom of a tank, the cause of the leak, Huang told reporters.
Under the utility’s decentralized management system, oil leaks are only reported when they are beyond a certain size, Huang said, adding that he believed workers at the oil depot decided not to report the matter because they thought they could fix the problem on their own.
Apart from setting up oil contamination booms to prevent the spread of the oil, CPC has begun restoration work near the site and would continually monitor the pollution for a year, Huang said.
CPC is planning to outsource the pollution remediation project to minimize the effect of the leaked fuel, it said in a statement, without providing a detailed timetable.
“CPC should have immediately explained the whole situation to the public when the company found the leak,” Deputy Minister of Economic Affairs Tseng Wen-sheng (曾文生) told reporters, calling for corporate responsibility.
The ministry would instruct CPC to carry out a comprehensive review and take appropriate disciplinary action, Tseng said.
The depot director and manager who concealed the incident have been disciplined, with each receiving a major demerit, CPC said.
In related news, the results of tests that the Penghu County Environmental Bureau is to conduct on underwater samples collected from two wells at CPC’s oil depot on Tuesday last week are to be made public in two weeks, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) said yesterday.
The leak happened in June last year, while the bureau did not receive the utility’s notice until last week, EPA Soil and Groundwater Remediation Fund Management Board executive secretary Chen Shyh-wei (陳世偉) said.
The utility would face a fine of between NT$10,000 and NT$6 million (US$328 and US$196,818) for not reporting to the bureau of the leak happening within three hours, as required by Article 28 of the Water Pollution Control Act (水污染防治法), he said.
The local bureau might give the utility more fines if the latter did cause pollution to soil or groundwater, he said, adding total petroleum hydrocarbons are the key pollutants of the leak.
The EPA only knew about the incident yesterday from media reports because the bureau would not usually report it until it has sufficient evidence, Chen said, but added that some EPA officials have flown to the county to assist the bureau.
Additional reporting by CNA
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said it expected to issue a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-Wong tomorrow, which it said would possibly make landfall near central Taiwan. As of 2am yesterday, Fung-Wong was about 1,760km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, moving west-northwest at 26kph. It is forecast to reach Luzon in the northern Philippines by tomorrow, the CWA said. After entering the South China Sea, Typhoon Fung-Wong is likely to turn northward toward Taiwan, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張峻堯) said, adding that it would likely make landfall near central Taiwan. The CWA expects to issue a land
Taiwan’s exports soared to an all-time high of US$61.8 billion last month, surging 49.7 percent from a year earlier, as the global frenzy for artificial intelligence (AI) applications and new consumer electronics powered shipments of high-tech goods, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. It was the first time exports had exceeded the US$60 billion mark, fueled by the global boom in AI development that has significantly boosted Taiwanese companies across the international supply chain, Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) told a media briefing. “There is a consensus among major AI players that the upcycle is still in its early stage,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said it is expected to issue a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-wong this afternoon and a land warning tomorrow. As of 1pm, the storm was about 1,070km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, and was moving west-northwest at 28 to 32kph, according to CWA data. The storm had a radius of 250km, with maximum sustained winds of 173kph and gusts reaching 209kph, the CWA added. The storm is forecast to pass near Luzon in the Philippines before entering the South China Sea and potentially turning northward toward Taiwan, the CWA said. CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張峻堯) said
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi yesterday said that China using armed force against Taiwan could constitute a "survival-threatening situation" for Japan, allowing the country to mobilize the Japanese armed forces under its security laws. Takaichi made the remarks during a parliamentary session while responding to a question about whether a "Taiwan contingency" involving a Chinese naval blockade would qualify as a "survival-threatening situation" for Japan, according to a report by Japan’s Asahi Shimbun. "If warships are used and other armed actions are involved, I believe this could constitute a survival-threatening situation," Takaichi was quoted as saying in the report. Under Japan’s security legislation,
RSS