Environmentalists yesterday urged the Yunlin County Government not to renew Formosa Petrochemical Corp’s (FPCC) coal-fired boiler licenses next month, while the county promised it would use the strictest criteria in reviewing the company’s application.
Dozens of environmentalists rallied in front of Douliou Railway Station, calling on Yunlin County Commissioner Lee Chin-yung (李進勇) to fulfill his promise to ban coal and petroleum coke — the primary source of air pollution in the county — or, at least, to refuse to renew the licenses that are due to expire on June 11.
“We do not oppose [FPCC’s] naphtha cracker. We oppose its air pollution,” said Wang Li-ping (王麗萍), one of the demonstrators.
Photo: Lin Kuo-hsien, Taipei Times
The protesters demanded that the company replace coal with natural gas, as it did at its plant in Texas, and asked the county government to hold a public hearing this month before deciding on renewing the licenses.
The Taipei Department of Environmental Protection held such a hearing in February to review the applications of Chang Chun Petrochemical Corp and Jinzhou Technology Corp, and eventually reduced the amount of their coal permit by 94 percent, Taiwan Healthy Air Action Alliance researcher Hsu Hsin-hsin (許心欣) said.
The Yunlin Environmental Protection Bureau can do the same, Hsu said.
She added that the group has obtained some information on the licenses, but parts of the information are not available because of FPCC’s confidentiality claims, such as the price and description of the coal it buys.
The bureau issued a statement acknowledging the group’s efforts to fight for public health and said it would adopt the strictest criteria when reviewing the company’s application to renew its licenses.
It said it had tightened control over the plant since 2015, reducing its coal permit by 2,312,726 tonnes and its petroleum coke license by 609,340 tonnes, as well as shortening the duration of its license from five years to two.
As for the group’s call for a public hearing, Air Quality Protection and Noise Control section chief Liao Chong-huan (廖崇圜) said Lee had turned down the suggestion at a meeting of the Yunlin County Council last month.
The Ministry of Education (MOE) is to launch a new program to encourage international students to stay in Taiwan and explore job opportunities here after graduation, Deputy Minister of Education Yeh Ping-cheng (葉丙成) said on Friday. The government would provide full scholarships for international students to further their studies for two years in Taiwan, so those who want to pursue a master’s degree can consider applying for the program, he said. The fields included are science, technology, engineering, mathematics, semiconductors and finance, Yeh added. The program, called “Intense 2+2,” would also assist international students who completed the two years of further studies in
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) departed for Europe on Friday night, with planned stops in Lithuania and Denmark. Tsai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on Friday night, but did not speak to reporters before departing. Tsai wrote on social media later that the purpose of the trip was to reaffirm the commitment of Taiwanese to working with democratic allies to promote regional security and stability, upholding freedom and democracy, and defending their homeland. She also expressed hope that through joint efforts, Taiwan and Europe would continue to be partners building up economic resilience on the global stage. The former president was to first
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Monday called for greater cooperation between Taiwan, Lithuania and the EU to counter threats to information security, including attacks on undersea cables and other critical infrastructure. In a speech at Vilnius University in the Lithuanian capital, Tsai highlighted recent incidents in which vital undersea cables — essential for cross-border data transmission — were severed in the Taiwan Strait and the Baltic Sea over the past year. Taiwanese authorities suspect Chinese sabotage in the incidents near Taiwan’s waters, while EU leaders have said Russia is the likely culprit behind similar breaches in the Baltic. “Taiwan and our European
The Taipei District Court sentenced babysitters Liu Tsai-hsuan (劉彩萱) and Liu Jou-lin (劉若琳) to life and 18 years in prison respectively today for causing the death of a one-year-old boy in December 2023. The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said that Liu Tsai-hsuan was entrusted with the care of a one-year-old boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), in August 2023 by the Child Welfare League Foundation. From Sept. 1 to Dec. 23 that year, she and her sister Liu Jou-lin allegedly committed acts of abuse against the boy, who was rushed to the hospital with severe injuries on Dec. 24, 2023, but did not
RSS