Taiwan is working to boost energy reserves to boost the island’s resilience in the event of a crisis, the vice economy minister said, as China stepped up military pressure to try to force Taiwan to accept Chinese rule. China’s exercise of a blockade around Taiwan in August, following a visit to Taipei by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, raised the island’s fears over the prospect of an attack by its giant neighbor, which has not ruled out using force to subdue democratically-ruled Taiwan. management.
Tseng Wen-Sheng, one of Taiwan’s vice economic ministers, told Reuters in an interview that the government was increasing its reserves of natural gas and coal as part of President Tsai Ing-wen’s push to boost the island’s “resilience” in an emergency amid growing global geopolitical and economic uncertainties. “When that happens, we need to be able to apply pressure to some degree,” Tseng said when asked about the prospect of a Chinese blockade or attack on trade-dependent Taiwan, which imports 98 percent of its energy.
By building new storage facilities across Taiwan, the ministry plans to increase natural gas reserves to more than 20 days by 2030, from the current level of 11 days. Tseng said coal stocks will increase in the coming years, while oil stocks will continue at more than 100 days. He declined to give details because releasing such information “doesn’t do Taiwan any good”.
China claims Taiwan as its own territory and has stepped up military and political pressure on the island in the past two years. Taipei strongly rejects Beijing’s claims to sovereignty and vows to defend its freedom and democracy. Taiwanese authorities are looking into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the country’s resistance should China ever follow through on its threat to attack the island, including studying war tactics and the use of satellites to communicate with the outside world.
