Politically inconvenient choices define the search for more power as AC units switch on for the summer and Taiwan’s renewable push struggles to make headway.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/04/24
By: By Timothy Ferry

Photo Credit: Reuters/達志影

Among the “five shortages” identified by Taiwan’s Chinese National Federation of Industries (CNFI) and currently being addressed by the government in a series of policy initiatives, electrical power is seen as the most crucial.

Taiwan’s generating capacity has actually declined in recent years as older coal- and oil-fired power plants have been retired. With the Jinshan Nuclear Power Plant (NPP1) already shuttered due to the inability to refuel two years before schedule, along with the suspension in 2014 of the Lungmen project (NPP4) that was expected to generate as much as 15 percent of Taiwan’s total power needs, the state-owned Taiwan Power Co. (TPC) has struggled to meet demand for the past two years during the hot season (from May until late fall). Reserve margins, spare capacity that can be brought online in a relatively short time to meet surges in demand or compensate for breakdowns, have repeatedly fallen to less than 2 percent.    [FULL  STORY]