New Taipei City Mayor and 2024 presidential candidate Hou You-yi (侯友宜) says he would seek to restart operations at all of Taiwan’s nuclear power plants if elected. Hou laid out his energy plan on Wednesday, which included restarting two nuclear power plants that were decommissioned in 2021 and 2023. Hou adds that he would enlist a group of experts to conduct a comprehensive safety review for the unfinished Lungmen Nuclear Power Plant, and support its operation if the plant passes the safety review.
A referendum in 2021 which called for restarting construction at the Lungmen plant had failed to pass. The Maanshan Nuclear Power Plant in Pingtung County is the only operating nuclear plant in Taiwan as of today.
The plan from Hou, a member of the Kuomintang party (KMT), is in stark contrast to the ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) plan, which aims to end nuclear power generation in Taiwan by 2025.
Hou says that Taiwan’s nuclear future should not be limited to only the four available plants, but could also include smaller-scale generators such as Small Modular Reactors (SMR). Hou stated that he believes Taiwan can use nuclear power to achieve its longer-term goal of reducing carbon-emitting energy generation to zero by 2050.
DPP on Wednesday held a press conference in response to Hou’s plan. They say that Hou had previously supported the decommissioning of the nuclear plants, and they question his plan to re-open the plant at Lungmen. They say that this is a non-issue, and are disappointed that Hou would use it to garner KMT votes.
Third-party presidential candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) has also stated that if Taiwan wants to have energy-intensive companies like semiconductor manufacturer TSMC, it should reconsider its nuclear energy policies.
Source: Radio Taiwan International
