Wu Youbin, chairman of the Taipower Labor Union. (File photo)
[Reporter Lin Jinghua/Report from Taipei] Taipower may lose more than 70 billion yuan this year. Wu Youbin, chairman of the Taipower Labor Union, came out to say that if the financial situation continues to deteriorate, it may be a repeat of the situation during the Maldives government that was forced to reduce equipment investment, maintenance and replacement due to excessive losses. This will not only affect Taipower employees, but may also expose the public to power outage accidents, further affecting the development of industry and people's livelihood.
Taipower has lost NT$20.4 billion as of August this year, and its cumulative losses have reached NT$371.2 billion. The Executive Yuan has proposed an additional budget of NT$71.1 billion for 2015 to supplement Taipower in the hope of stabilizing domestic electricity prices. However, the key to whether this can be achieved remains with the Legislative Yuan.
Please read on...
Wu Youbin said that in the past, the Ministry of Economic Affairs had twice proposed a subsidy budget of NT$100 billion each for Taipower, but both were deleted by the Legislative Yuan. He admitted frankly that when he visited legislators from the ruling and opposition parties, many members expressed "personal" support, but in the end they were still defeated by the pressure of the party group and blocked the allocation of the budget on the grounds of "party group opposition." After the Legislative Yuan convenes in the near future, the electric power union will visit legislators more frequently, hoping to let the legislators understand that for Taipower to maintain stable power supply quality in its jurisdiction, sound finances are the basic conditions.
As a front-line technician at Taipower, Wu Youbin also recalled that during the Ma government in 2013, Taipower's cumulative losses were as high as 175.6 billion yuan. At that time, in order to turn losses into profits, Taipower had to reduce major capital expenditures, cut operation and maintenance expenses, and launch a parts life extension plan. As a result, some equipment that should be replaced was not updated in time, and the subsequent power supply quality was also affected. In the past few years, public dissatisfaction with frequent power outages reflected the failure to invest in timely improvements in the past.
For Taipower's frontline employees, in addition to equipment maintenance, on-site emergency repairs also face the problem of insufficient spare parts inventory, making emergency repairs more difficult. Wu Youbin emphasized that allocating the supplementary budget is not only a financial issue for Taipower, but also affects whether front-line employees can obtain sufficient resources and safe conditions to perform their work.
He further pointed out that although Taipower has followed the military, public and educational staff in adjusting salaries in recent years, the overall financial situation is still very serious. If the loss exceeds 70 billion yuan this year and the bleeding cannot be stopped, the cumulative loss may return to more than 400 billion yuan. "Who would want to join a company that is on the verge of financial bankruptcy?" Wu Youbin said that in recent years, graduates from the Department of Electrical Engineering have mostly gone to high-tech industries. It often takes up to 10 years to develop technical talents in Taipower. The problem is not just the training time, but "no one wants to join Taipower." This will form a serious manpower gap and a shortage of jobs.
Facing the continued expansion of the AI and semiconductor industries, electricity demand will continue to rise in the next 10 years. Wu Youbin said that in the long run, electricity prices should still reasonably reflect fuel costs, but due to policy considerations, Taiwan cannot fully follow international practices, so government budget support is still an important way to maintain Taipower's financial health.
He pointed out that Japan and South Korea mostly adopt mechanisms where fuel costs directly reflect electricity prices. When Taipower's labor union communicated with Japan and South Korea, the other parties were surprised that Taiwan can still maintain high-quality power supply under relatively low electricity prices. However, if Taipower's finances continue to deteriorate, whether equipment, manpower and power supply quality can be maintained in the future will become a greater challenge.
Grasp the economic pulse with one hand. Click here to subscribe to Free Finance Youtube Channel
