Taiwan has been taking monthly inventories of critical supplies such as food and fuel in case of a conflict with China, a government official said yesterday.
China mounted war games around the nation in August following a visit to Taipei by US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi that included firing missiles and steps to mount a blockade.
Deputy Minister of Economic Affairs Chen Chern-chyi (陳正祺) said it is already codified in law to maintain energy stockpiles, which Taiwan Power Co and CPC Corp, Taiwan do.
Photo: Lo Pei-de, Taipei Times
“With respect to a possible military conflict, we do have preparations for food and for energy, and critical supplies, including manufacturing supplies. We have a system, we do inventory every month,” Chen said.
“We want to ensure we have a certain period of stockpiles in Taiwan, including food, including critical supplies, minerals, chemicals and energy of course,” he added.
Taiwan’s power mix is made up of liquefied natural gas (LNG), coal, nuclear and renewables, the latter of which the government is trying to scale up, Chen said.
“We remain very comfortable with respect to these possible energy security issues,” Chen added.
Taiwan aims to generate more electricity from LNG in the shift away from coal-powered and nuclear plants, and is building a massive new LNG terminal.
Speaking separately at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei, where she was taking lawmakers’ questions, Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua (王美花) said that meetings have been taking place to discuss increasing LNG storage capacity.
“Certainly when it comes to LNG storage, we have previously already had cross-department discussions on this,” Wang said.
Those talks also involved whether to use Taiwan-flagged tankers to import LNG, she said.
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