Taiwan’s Offshore Wind Energy Policy: From Policy Dilemma to Sustainable Development

Abstract

Taiwan’s offshore wind energy policy (OWE policy) is a response to sustainable development goals. Offshore wind energy has become one of the fastest growing renewable energies on Taiwan’s coastline, with the government’s full support for the promotion and implementation of the OWE policy. With the operation of Taiwan’s first wind farm in 2021, increasing controversies are specifically concerned with the distribution of social, economic, and environmental burdens and benefits resulting from the OWE policy. More offshore wind farms are forthcoming by 2025. However, little attention has been paid to policy dilemmas for many aspects relevant to sustainable development. Therefore, this paper conducts a policy analysis to construct policy-relevant information of the OWE policy and identifies policy dilemmas in relation to concerns about sustainable development. This paper presents policy recommendations on the design and decision-making processes for facilitating the smooth promotion and implementation of Taiwan’s OWE policy and future renewable energy policies.

Causality of Risk Assessment Attributes under Uncertainty in Taiwan’s Offshore Wind Farms Development

“…With the application of FDEMATEL, and after generating the total normalized crisp values using Equations ( 3)-( 5), the direct relationship matrix and normalized direct matrix for the aspects are generated using Equation (7), which aggregated the normalized crisp values from all experts, as shown in Tables 4 and 5, respectively. Equations ( 8)-( 10) are employed to create the total interrelationship matrix and show the cause-effect diagram based on ( α + β) and ( α − β), as shown in Table 6.…”

“…OWFs are being promoted in Taiwan but the development has faced several challenges since its early phase such as rejection from the community, disruption to the fishery, potential displacement of wildlife, and concerns on navigation safety [4][5][6]. Chung [7] claimed that Taiwan's government has placed a great investment in the form of political and financial resources into developing OFWs; however, diverse risks have been slowing down the development. Specifically, from the feasibility perspective, the risks are associated with damages to fishermen's rights because of an overlapping landscape with the traditional fishing grounds, which raises risks that affect the fishing industry in general, leading up to public resistance or acceptance and change of income [8,9].…”

A Decarbonization Roadmap for Taiwan and Its Energy Policy Implications

“…In addition, there are sustainability issues with offshore wind in Taiwan. For example, the west coast of Taiwan is a habitat for the endangered Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin [34]. Furthermore, sites designated for offshore wind development are also rich fishing grounds for coastal communities.…”

“…Furthermore, sites designated for offshore wind development are also rich fishing grounds for coastal communities. Installation of offshore wind farms, which may interrupt or prohibit the use of marine resources on Taiwan's west coast, will encounter resistance from local communities [34].…”

Using the Sustainability-Balanced Scorecard for Assessing Sustainability Issues of the Green Energy Companies

“…Taiwan to boost renewable energy to 20% by 2025. While Taiwan is still far from a sustainable electricity supply, relying heavily on nuclear (12.7%), natural-gas (21.4%) and coal (43.3%) (Chung, 2021), so far, Taiwan has developing in growing novel capacity, particularly in the wind power sector. The total capacity of wind energy in Taiwan amounted to approximately 854 megawatts in 2020, an increase from around 845 megawatts in the previous year.…”