New license plates starting with the letter “E” are to be issued for electric scooters starting next year to allow easier recognition, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications said on Friday, adding that plates that have numbers with cultural significance would be available through a bidding process for all scooters except the smallest models.
The purpose for issuing new plates is to comply with regulations for “smart” vehicles, Motor Vehicle Division Deputy Chief Lin Yi-sheng (林義勝) said.
Beginning the plate numbers with the letter “E” — for “electric” — would permit all agencies to easily distinguish electric-powered scooters from gasoline-powered ones, Lin said.
Photo: CNA, provided by the Directorate General of Highways
Aside from the plate sequence starting with an “E” followed by two English letters and four numbers, the plates’ color, material, anti-forgery seal and fonts are to be identical to the plates for gasoline-powered scooters, Lin said, adding that the new plates would have the words “electricity-powered vehicle” in Chinese at the top.
Conventional plates have been issued for 107,833 electric scooters, of which 58,746 are small light scooters — those with a top speed under 45kph — and 47,676 are regular scooters — those with between 1.34 and 5 horsepower (hp) and a top speed above 45kph, Lin said.
It is not mandatory that new plates be issued next year for those with conventional plates, Lin said.
If scooter owners want the new plates, they must pay NT$300 in handling fees, while those who own large scooters — those with more than 54hp — must pay NT$400.
Using the number of new plates issued last month as a reference, the office is looking to issue 100,000 plates next year, Lin said.
Plates with “lucky” license numbers — with four 6s, four 8s or four 9s — are to be put up for bidding, the ministry said.
The character ba (八) — the number eight in Mandarin — sounds similar to fa (發, “prosperity”) and is therefore considered lucky. Double sixes are considered to indicate that a person is about to have a smooth deal, while one can never go wrong by having two double sixes.
The license plates issued for electric-powered cars, bordered in green on the top and bottom, will not be issued once they have run out, the ministry said.
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
IN FULL SWING: Recall drives against lawmakers in Hualien, Taoyuan and Hsinchu have reached the second-stage threshold, the campaigners said Campaigners in a recall petition against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) in Taichung yesterday said their signature target is within sight, and that they need a big push to collect about 500 more signatures from locals to reach the second-stage threshold. Recall campaigns against KMT lawmakers Johnny Chiang (江啟臣), Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔) and Lo Ting-wei (羅廷瑋) are also close to the 10 percent threshold, and campaigners are mounting a final push this week. They need about 800 signatures against Chiang and about 2,000 against Yang. Campaigners seeking to recall Lo said they had reached the threshold figure over the
RSS