Taiwan imports 99 percent of its energy, which is vital to its
rapidly industrializing economy. The island nation’s electricity
demand was recently growing at almost 5 percent per year, but
this is slowing to about 3.3 percent per annum to 2013. Nuclear
power has been a significant part of the electricity supply for
two decades and now provides 17 percent of the country’s overall
energy needs. But this has come at a potential cost. The
country’s three nuclear power plants (NPPs) comprise four
General Electric boiling water reactors and two Westinghouse
pressurized water reactors. Taiwan launched its nuclear power
project in 1972 with the construction of a General Electric
boiling water reactor (BWR) at the Chinshan 1 Nuclear Plant in
northern Taiwan. By 1985 Taiwan had a total of six reactors
online at the Chinshan, Kuosheng and Maanshan NPPs, which
provided nearly 20 percent of the island’s power that fueled
Taiwan’s economic take off. The NPPs are operated by the Taiwan
Power Co. (Taipower) utility under th