Three of the nation’s presidential candidates are to take part in a televised climate policy debate next month, the event’s organizers, Greenpeace Taiwan and the International Climate Development Institute (ICDI), said on Thursday.
ICDI director Camyale Chao (趙恭岳) said the debate is to take place on Oct. 21, and that the nominees of Taiwan’s three largest political parties — Vice President William Lai (賴清德) of the Democratic Progressive Party, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) of the Taiwan People’s Party — have agreed to attend.
Greenpeace project manager Lena Chang (張皪心) said the candidates would take questions from representatives of the media, academia and the business world, as well as questions submitted online by members of the public.
Photo: Chen Chia-yi, Taipei Times
Due to time constraints, the candidates might not be able to respond to each other’s answers or engage in back-and-forth debate, she said.
Chang said the two other candidates in the presidential race — Hon Hai Precision Industry Co founder Terry Gou (郭台銘) and former Tainan County commissioner Su Huan-chih (蘇煥智) — might also be invited, depending on how their efforts to collect signatures and qualify for the ballot are going.
Although the candidates have laid out their energy policy proposals — mainly hinging on their support or opposition to nuclear energy — to date, none has published a formal climate or environmental platform.
On Thursday, Greenpeace called on the candidates to commit, and put forward plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent and ensure renewable energy sources account for 40 percent of Taiwan’s energy mix by 2030.
Last year, 82.42 percent of the energy generated in Taiwan came from fossil fuels (mainly coal and liquefied natural gas), while 8.28 percent came from renewable energy sources, 8.24 percent from nuclear power and 1.06 percent from pumped storage hydropower, according to Bureau of Energy data.
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
More than 6,000 Taiwanese students have participated in exchange programs in China over the past two years, despite the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) “orange light” travel advisory, government records showed. The MAC’s publicly available registry showed that Taiwanese college and university students who went on exchange programs across the Strait numbered 3,592 and 2,966 people respectively. The National Immigration Agency data revealed that 2,296 and 2,551 Chinese students visited Taiwan for study in the same two years. A review of the Web sites of publicly-run universities and colleges showed that Taiwanese higher education institutions continued to recruit students for Chinese educational programs without
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
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