A series of low-carbon city forums organized by the Environmental Protection Administration are being held between Nov. 21 and 24 in Yilan County and the cities of Taichung, New Taipei and Tainan.
The forums, put on jointly by the Taiwan Institute for Sustainable Energy and the German Institute Taipei, provide an opportunity for local government officials to engage in policy dialogue and exchanges of experience on sustainable development at the municipal level with environmental officials from Hamburg, Germany, the EPA said.
Speaking at the opening, EPA Minister Stephen Shu-hung Shen said Taiwan can learn a great deal from Germany’s success in implementing sustainable energy and climate change mitigation policies.
Shen noted that these policies, including the establishment of a feed-in tariff system aimed at spurring development of the renewable energy sector, have been effective in boosting energy efficiency and conservation, reducing carbon emissions and meeting the country’s energy needs.
The EPA said it is currently actively promoting the establishment of low-carbon communities and low-carbon cities around Taiwan. Two communities in each of the island’s 25 cities and counties have already been selected as low-carbon community models where assistance will be provided in carrying out energy conservation diagnosis and promoting carbon reduction measures.
In addition, the county government of Yilan and the municipal governments of New Taipei, Taichung and Tainan were chosen in August to set up model low-carbon cities in their jurisdictions, the EPA said.
The EPA pointed out that the goal is to create a low-carbon homeland over the next 10 years through the gradual growth and replication of low-carbon communities, until the entire country is encompassed within four low-carbon living spheres in the north, south, east and west.
