Taiwan’s Environmental Protection Agency and the European Economic and Trade Office held the first EU-TW Environmental Impact Assessment Seminar in Taipei on Monday. Participants included the head EU envoy to Taiwan, Filip Grzegorzewski, and the policy officer for the EU’s environmental agency, Marcela McAndrew.
Monday’s seminar was an opportunity for participants to share experience in the areas of environmental impact assessments, offshore wind farming, and other conservation topics.
Taiwan’s environmental protection chief, Chang Tzi-chin, said that the government began advocating for environmental impact assessments in 1986. Relevant laws were passed in 1994, but they were ineffective because there was a lack of understanding in the private sector. Chang says that companies often get caught up debating the finer details of the law, rather than working to minimize their impact on the environment.
Chang says that environmental impact assessments aren’t meant to hinder industrial development. They are meant to assess the companies’ goals and find ways of minimizing environmental damage.
Chang says that when it comes to the government’s development of offshore wind farms, there’s a lack of experience in conducting environmental impact assessments. He says he hopes Taiwan can learn from the EU’s experience to conduct the most effective assessments.