Tue, Jan 19, 2010 page2

• EPA decries failure to pass environmental law

  PRIORITIES While the agency blamed the legislature for stalling the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Act, activists panned the proposal's disputed carbon trading system

  • By Vincent Y. Chao / STAFF REPORTER
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  The legislature's failure to pass a key environmental law during the last legislative session showed that lawmakers still do not consider environmental issues a high priority, officials from the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) said yesterday.

  EPA Deputy Minister Chiu Wen-yen (邱文彥) said the setback was worrying but not unexpected.

  The agency had originally expressed optimism that the legislature could finish deliberations late last year and that the proposal would become law before the session ended last Tuesday.

  The agency submitted the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Act (溫室氣體減量法) in 2006, but it has been stalled in the legislature because of concerns over its impact on industry, officials said.

  Despite last-minute attempts by some legislators to raise the issue, attention shifted during the last week to other pieces of legislation, such as the controversial proposed amendment to the Local Government Act (地方制度法).

  “The bill is filled with many provisions ... as a result, the legislature had difficulty reaching a consensus,” Chiu said.

  “The situation is not unlike what happened during the Copenhagen conference,” he said, referring to the inability of international negotiators to forge a compromise during the UN climate summit last month.

  The proposed law includes measures that seek to limit and then decrease carbon emissions nationwide. EPA officials have said that the law would include facilitation, responsive implementation and stringent enforcement.

  More specifically, the proposal included a controversial carbon trading system that environmental organizations blasted as ineffective. Instead, they called for the creation of carbon taxes they said would have a bigger impact.

  “We originally hoped that carbon or energy taxes could be a part of the proposal,” said Chen Man-li (陳曼麗), director of the non-profit Taiwan Environmental Information Association.

  Chen said the nation’s continued high rate of carbon emissions was troubling, especially coupled with the current administration’s development-based policies.

  “It’s clear — exemplified by the lack of focus on the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Act — that the government doesn’t really care about the environment … the focus is on the economy,” Chen said, adding that the government would have to adopt a more conservation-based approach to avoid international reproach.

  “The rest of the world is moving ahead with their environmental policies … while Taiwan can't even pass [this act],” she said.

  However, the EPA maintained that despite the failure of the act to pass the legislature, the government was still committed to fulfilling President Ma Ying-jeou's (馬英九) pledge to reduce carbon emissions to 50 percent of 2025's levels by 2050.

  Officials said the agency would focus on policies such as education and initiatives that involve a voluntary response.

  “It would have been nice to have the law ... [but] our agency will have to do what it can,” Chiu said.
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