Fine tuning the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process and granting more power to subcommittees are the first things incoming Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) minister Steven Shen (沈世宏) plans to do after taking the post today.
Speaking at a lunch with the press, Shen said he planned to include the work of the developers as well as environmental groups in EIA case subcommittees.
There needs to be a clearer division of labor between the EIA committee and case subcommittees, he said.
CONSTRUCTION
While subcommittees would judge the individual impact and consequences of construction proposals, the committee would decide whether to go ahead with construction projects based on the subcommittee’s impact analysis, he said.
Another priority of the EPA was to draft, within the next six months, the 12 policies incoming president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) environmental policy white paper, including the greenhouse gas reduction law and an energy tax law, Shen said.
In response to the media’s questions on whether the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would reopen the Suhua Freeway case, Shen said the proposal was currently in the hands of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications.
“The controversy is not on the freeway per se, but on the direction for development in the east ... however this would be a decision made at the Cabinet level,” he said.
FAREWELL
The arrival of new public servants means the former ones must go and a farewell party was held yesterday for the outgoing EPA Minister Winston Dang (陳重信).
Dang said the handover signified a rotation of power between parties, which was a natural and healthy thing for Taiwan’s democracy.
Quoting Winston Churchill who lost the post-war election after the Allies won World War II in 1945, Dang said: “I leave when the pub closes.”
At the farewell event, Dang listed positive environmental diplomatic work, significant river cleanups, and the stalling of major developmental projects such as the Suhua Freeway and Kuokuang Petrochemical Technology Co’s (國光石化科技) proposed chemical plant as the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) environmental protection achievements.
“Construction developers should take into account the cost of [a long] EIA process ... though the EPA is not bestowed much power, we are professional and insistent on our values as well as the direction that our national development should follow,” he said.
Also, Taiwan’s recycling rate is possibly now the best in the world, he said.
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake struck off the coast of Hualien County in eastern Taiwan at 7pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The epicenter of the temblor was at sea, about 69.9km south of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 30.9km, it said. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County’s Changbin Township (長濱), where it measured 5 on Taiwan’s seven-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 4 in Hualien, Nantou, Chiayi, Yunlin, Changhua and Miaoli counties, as well as
Taiwan is to have nine extended holidays next year, led by a nine-day Lunar New Year break, the Cabinet announced yesterday. The nine-day Lunar New Year holiday next year matches the length of this year’s holiday, which featured six extended holidays. The increase in extended holidays is due to the Act on the Implementation of Commemorative and Festival Holidays (紀念日及節日實施條例), which was passed early last month with support from the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party. Under the new act, the day before Lunar New Year’s Eve is also a national holiday, and Labor Day would no longer be limited
COMMITMENTS: The company had a relatively low renewable ratio at 56 percent and did not have any goal to achieve 100 percent renewable energy, the report said Pegatron Corp ranked the lowest among five major final assembly suppliers in progressing toward Apple Inc’s commitment to be 100 percent carbon neutral by 2030, a Greenpeace East Asia report said yesterday. While Apple has set the goal of using 100 percent renewable energy across its entire business, supply chain and product lifecycle by 2030, carbon emissions from electronics manufacturing are rising globally due to increased energy consumption, it said. Given that carbon emissions from its supply chain accounted for more than half of its total emissions last year, Greenpeace East Asia evaluated the green transition performance of Apple’s five largest final
The first tropical storm of the year in the western North Pacific, Wutip (蝴蝶), has formed over the South China Sea and is expected to move toward Hainan Island off southern China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. The agency said a tropical depression over waters near the Paracel and Zhongsha islands strengthened into a tropical storm this morning. The storm had maximum sustained winds near its center of 64.8kph, with peak gusts reaching 90kph, it said. Winds at Beaufort scale level 7 — ranging from 50kph to 61.5kph — extended up to 80km from the center, it added. Forecaster Kuan Hsin-ping