Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) yesterday told Cabinet officials to arrange a visit to the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in Gongliao District (貢寮), New Taipei City (新北市), to gain the necessary knowledge to defend the government’s policy to complete the facility.
Jiang issued the directive at a Cabinet meeting, Executive Yuan spokesperson Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) said.
Cheng said Jiang wanted all Cabinet officials to visit the near-completed power plant to gain information so that they can speak out in defense of the Cabinet’s stance.
The Cabinet yesterday published a pamphlet of questions and answers on the government’s nuclear energy policy, with 14,000 copies available free of charge to people working at the Executive Yuan.
In the pamphlet, the Cabinet dismisses concerns over the lack of repositories for the disposal of nuclear waste as a reason to oppose the power plant, saying that it is international practice that a government builds a nuclear power plant and looks for a repository for spent nuclear fuel simultaneously.
Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) has been looking for a repository for spent fuel rods in a stable geological formation, while low-activity radioactive waste could be placed in Daren Township (達仁), Taitung County, or Wuciou Township (烏坵), Kinmen County, if residents give their consent in a local referendum.
Daren and Wuciou were selected by the Ministry of Economic Affairs as potential final repositories for nuclear waste in September 2010, but residents and elected officials in the districts have voiced opposition to the plan.
The pamphlet led to an hour-long discussion at the meeting.
An official who asked to remain anonymous said some officials doubted that the two proposals for a repository for nuclear waste disposal were workable.
“The two proposals are not possible solutions to the problem of disposal of nuclear waste,” Deputy Minister of the Interior Lin Tzu-ling (林慈玲) said.
“The project to develop a repository had been called off due to strong opposition from the Hualien County Government. Both the Taitung County Government and the Kinmen County Government are opposed to referendums,” Lin said.
In Taiwan, low-level nuclear waste produced by the six reactors at the three operating nuclear power plants is placed in a waste storage facility on Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼), off the coast of Taitung County, while high-level waste and spent fuel rods are stored in cooling pools at the three plants.
Public Construction Commission Minister Chen Jeng-chuan (陳振川) said he doubted chances of nuclear waste being disposed anywhere on Taiwan proper while Orchid Island residents remain concerned about the safety of the nuclear waste.
People fear nuclear power because they are not always well-informed about the scientific principles of the design and construction of nuclear power plants and because they have no confidence in the government, Chen said.
Chen suggested that the government encourage members of the public, such as Taipower employees, to speak up for the safety of nuclear power plants.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and
RSS