CLEANER AIR: It was the first time since the Taichung plant was constructed 30 years ago that the city had acted to slash coal use in hopes of reducing pollution
Taipei Times
Date: Nov 30, 2017
By: Huang Pei-chun and Jake Chung / Staff reporter, with staff writer
The Taichung City Government yesterday approved state-run Taiwan Power Co’s
Taiwan Power Co’s Taichung Power Plant is pictured yesterday. Photo: Tsai Shu-yuan, Taipei Times
(Taipower, 台電) request to extend the service life of nine coal-fired generators at its Taichung Power Plant, with the proviso that the plant cuts its bituminous coal usage by almost a quarter.
Taipower said that such a drastic cut would decrease the plant’s annual power generation by 4.5 billion kilowatt-hours and could pose a risk to the nation’s power supply.
Taipower said that it filed applications for an extension on Nov. 6 and on Friday last week, but both proposals were rejected by the city government for not going far enough in reducing coal usage.
In its second application, Taipower proposed slashing its annual coal usage by 3.15 million tonnes, but the city government said the proposed volume would not meet the reduction in coal usage required by the Autonomous Act for Coal Regulation (台中市管制生煤自治條例). [FULL STORY]
