About 19 tonnes of garbage was collected yesterday by 507 divers in a nationwide ocean cleanup initiated by the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA).
As of 6pm, about 19 tonnes of trash had been collected from the seabed, not including New Taipei City and Lienchiang County, as they had started later, EPA Department of Water Quality Protection Director Yeh Chun-hung (葉俊宏) said.
Keelung’s Chaojing Park (潮境公園) was the main venue for the event, where EPA Minister Lee Ying-yuan (李應元) spoke to participants nationwide via live-streamed video.
Photo courtesy of the Keelung City Government
Chiayi County Commissioner Helen Chang (張花冠) told Lee they had even found an iPhone 5 and an electric steamer in the ocean.
More than 120 volunteers rushed to register for the event as soon as the city government announced it, Keelung Department of Economic Affairs Marine Affairs division chief Tsai Fu-ning (蔡馥嚀) said.
Chaojing Park was used as a landfill before it became a park in 2002, Tsai said, adding that the city government last year designated the intertidal waters off the park as a conservation bay, where fishing and harvesting seaweed are forbidden.
One of the divers, Lin Yo-ping (林佑平), said he and fellow members of his diving society have been volunteering to clean seabeds nationwide since 2014.
Despite the many fishing nets discarded in the area, the diving society has begun to see more fish, dolphins and sea turtles in the conservation bay, he said.
Lin said he has become increasingly optimistic about the nation’s oceanic environment, but added that the real problem is garbage on land, not in the sea.
“Reducing the volume of trash is the key to solving the problem,” he said.
The EPA is tightening its restrictions on plastic bags, with nearly 100,000 additional stores saying they will not provide free plastic bags starting next year, Lee said, adding he hopes the nation will become plastic-free one day.
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
Credit departments of farmers’ and fishers’ associations blocked a total of more than NT$180 million (US$6.01 million) from being lost to scams last year, National Police Agency (NPA) data showed. The Agricultural Finance Agency (AFA) said last week that staff of farmers’ and fishers’ associations’ credit departments are required to implement fraud prevention measures when they serve clients at the counter. They would ask clients about personal financial management activities whenever they suspect there might be a fraud situation, and would immediately report the incident to local authorities, which would send police officers to the site to help, it said. NPA data showed
ENERGY RESILIENCE: Although Alaska is open for investments, Taiwan is sourcing its gas from the Middle East, and the sea routes carry risks, Ho Cheng-hui said US government officials’ high-profile reception of a Taiwanese representative at the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference indicated the emergence of an Indo-Pacific energy resilience alliance, an academic said. Presidential Office Secretary-General Pan Men-an (潘孟安) attended the conference in Alaska on Thursday last week at the invitation of the US government. Pan visited oil and gas facilities with senior US officials, including US Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, US Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy and US Senator Daniel Sullivan. Pan attending the conference on behalf of President William Lai (賴清德) shows a significant elevation in diplomatic representation,
The Taipei MRT is to begin accepting mobile payment services in the fall, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said on Saturday. When the company finishes the installation of new payment units at ticketing gates in October, MRT passengers can use credit cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay and Samsung Pay, the operator said. In addition, the MRT would also provide QR payment codes — which would be compatible with Line Pay, Jkopay, iPass Money, PXPay Plus, EasyWallet, iCash Pay, Taiwan Pay and Taishin Pay — to access the railway system. Currently, passengers can access the Taipei MRT by buying a single-journey token or using EasyCard,
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