In Taiwan’s largest-ever energy survey, seven in ten Taiwanese told local magazine Tianxia their desire to support nuclear energy production on the island. The following question was asked to 14,762 people: “The government has set a goal of becoming a ‘nuclear-free’ country by 2025. Do you support nuclear power production in Taiwan?” For the majority of Taiwanese, the answer is yes.
According to Liang Qiyuan, a professor at the National Central University in Taiwan, this public plebiscite against nuclear power is closely linked to the power outages that have occurred in recent years. He cites several dates where “Major power outages across the entire island lasted from seven hours to an entire day” : August 15, 2017, May 13, 2021 and March 3, 2022.
A sign that the subject concerns residents: when the authorities assure that there is no risk of an electricity shortage in Taiwan, “neither now nor in the future”, 70% of Taiwanese disagree, and 40% are “strongly disagree”.
Pollution from thermal power plants
For Liang Qiyuan, this high level of support for nuclear power echoes the international context, with n
