The Taipei City Government has followed the lead of neighboring New Taipei City by starting to enforce emissions standards for vehicles entering special “air quality protection zones”.
The 2018 Air Pollution Control Act allows local governments to designate zones where vehicles that fail to meet certain emissions standards are banned.
New Taipei took the lead, becoming the first local government to create and enforce such zones in September last year. Taipei came next, establishing its own air quality zones at the start of the year and beginning to issue fines in February. Included in the Taipei zones are the areas surrounding six major tourist attractions.
Thirteen other cities and counties are drawing up their own plans for such zones in an effort to combat air pollution.
The zones in Taipei and New Taipei are enforced electronically, with cameras scanning the license plates of all vehicles entering and exiting air quality zones and automatically checking emissions testing records. Fines for motorists driving substandard vehicles in the zones are also issued automatically.
Under the law, these fines can reach as high as NT$60,000 (US$2,142), though Taipei is giving out smaller fines to first-time offenders based on the type of vehicle they are driving. Taipei’s Department of Environmental Protection estimates that the control zones will lead to an annual reduction of 27 tons of PM2.5 particulate matter in the air.