The Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) is next year to start changing some of its antiquated power facilities, with the cost of the four-year project expected to top NT$8 billion (US$280.30 million).
While the launch on Dec. 20 of electrified train services on the South Link Line — which was the nation’s last unelectrified railway line — marked a significant milestone, the agency yesterday said that some of its power facilities have reached the age of retirement after having been used for more than four decades.
The agency has been gradually retiring some of the high-risk power system facilities since 2015, it said.
As of the end of this year, it has changed 1,260km of main overhead wires, TRA electricity section chief Cheng Chih-ming (鄭志銘) said, adding that the new wires have increased structural tension by 22 percent and reduced the number of incidents caused by broken overhead wires.
The agency also increased the capacity of the transformers in nine of the substations along the line from 15 megavolt-amperes to 25 megavolt-amperes, Cheng said.
Workers’ ability to repair and maintain the wires have vastly improved through the use of 17 newly purchased overhead line maintenance vehicles, he added.
Cheng said the agency would spend NT$8 billion in the next four years to replace some of the critical infrastructure in its power system.
Traditional wires in the underground tunnel connecting New Taipei City’s Sijhih (汐止) and Fuchou (浮洲) railway stations — which stretches a total of 52km — would be replaced with conductor rail wires, he said.
The agency would also purchase two high-speed overhead line inspection vehicles, which can quickly convert collected information into quantitative data, he said.
“Our long-term goal is to develop an Internet-of-Things system to manage the facilities related to the railway system,” Cheng said. “Using a smart system would allow us to quickly locate a malfunctioning current transformer or a protective relay.”
“This would reduce our maintenance costs and enable us to run a safer and reliable train service,” he added.
Maintenance workers in the agency would also undergo training focused on life-cycle management systems for railway facilities, in which they would learn to better identify facilities that need replacement and propose changes, Cheng said.
The heads of three major US banks on Wednesday pledged that they would withdraw from the Chinese market if Washington imposed sanctions on Beijing in response to an invasion of Taiwan. JP Morgan Chase chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon, Bank of America chairman and CEO Brian Moynihan and Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser told lawmakers at a hearing of the US House of Representatives Committee on Financial Services in Washington that the three banks would follow the guidance of the US government to exit China if necessary. The three bankers made the pledge after US Representative Blaine Luetkemeyer asked the three if they
HIGH STAKES: An attack on Taiwan could prompt a joint response from the US and Japan, and trigger a global conflict that could bring down the CCP, Liu Tai-ying said The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) would not be able to launch an invasion of Taiwan for at least another 10 years, Taiwan Research Institute founder Liu Tai-ying (劉泰英) said on Friday. To occupy Taiwan, China needs to transport at least 300,000 to 400,000 troops across the Taiwan Strait during battle, but it would lack the ability to do so for at least another decade, said Liu, a former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) treasurer and a close aide to former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝). The challenges that China would face during an attempted invasion of Taiwan would be even greater than those
CHINA CRITIC: Prime ministerial candidate Giorgia Meloni, the front-runner in today’s election, said that she would not renew a Belt and Road Initiative deal with Beijing Italian lawmaker Giorgia Meloni, the front-runner to become the country’s next prime minister, is expected to reverse course on Italy’s support for China’s Belt and Road Initiative and strengthen ties with Taiwan if a coalition headed by her party wins the country’s general election today. “Without any doubt, if there is a center-right government, it is sure that Taiwan will be an essential concern for Italy,” Meloni told the Central News Agency in an interview. Italians are to vote in a snap election triggered by the resignation of Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi following a failed attempt to get his coalition partners
HAWAII MODEL: While Hawaii held a referendum on becoming the 50th US state, Taiwan has never applied to join the People’s Republic of China, Miles Yu said China comparing Taiwanese independence to Hawaii seeking independence from the US is illogical, as Taiwan has never applied to be a part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Hudson Institute senior fellow Miles Yu (余茂春) said over the weekend. Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅), who is in New York for the UN General Assembly, has given multiple talks asserting Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan. In a speech to the Asia Society on Thursday, Wang likened Taiwan to Hawaii. “Just as the US would not allow Hawaii to break away,” Beijing “reserves the right” to seek unification, Wang told the gathering. The
RSS