Taiwan Looking to Replace Nuclear Energy with LNG
- March 20, 2023
- Posted by: Quatro Strategies
- Category: Energy
Taiwan is set to buy more LNG next year as it closes one nuclear reactor and planning a complete phase out of nuclear power generation by 2025. Taiwan’s state-owned fossil fuel company CPC Corp purchased this week via a tender at least 10 cargoes of LNG, which will be delivered between May 2023 and March 2024. The LNG purchases are part of Taiwan’s strategy to procure more gas to offset the decline in nuclear power generation.
This week, Unit 2 of Taiwan’s Kuosheng nuclear power plant was taken offline and will be decommissioned following the expiry of its 40-year operating license. There are now two remaining nuclear reactors operating on the island at one nuclear power plant. Those reactors are expected to be shut down in 2024 and 2025.
Taiwanese government has previously pledged to phase out nuclear power generation by 2025. It has not backed down from its plan despite other countries have been reviewing their similar nuclear strategies, after the Russian invasion of Ukraine skyrocketed oil, natural gas and coal prices and exacerbated energy security concerns.
Even Japan, which has vowed to bring down nuclear energy in the aftermath of the 2011 Fukushima disaster, is considering using nuclear power for longer.
At the end of last year, the Japanese government confirmed a new nuclear energy policy, which the country had mostly abandoned since 2011.
A panel of experts under the Japanese Ministry of Industry decided late last year that Japan would allow the development of new nuclear reactors and allow available reactors to operate after the current limit of 60 years.
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