The large electricity user clause, which has been in effect for almost two years, requires companies with a contract capacity of 5,000 kilowatts (kW) or more to fulfill their obligation to use 10% green electricity within five years. As the review deadline approaches, the Taiwan Renewable Energy Alliance (TRENA) announced its 2021 annual statistics on the 19th, showing that among the top 20 domestic carbon-emitting companies, TSMC, which has the highest proportion of green electricity use, only uses 4% of its electricity, while the other 19 companies use less than 1%.
These 20 companies account for 44.6% of Taiwan's total carbon emissions. TRENA is calling on these companies to actively improve and hopes the government will tighten requirements for large electricity users. Legislators are also calling on the executive branch to expedite the release of draft amendments to the three energy laws to align with the country's net zero goals and build a more comprehensive green electricity supply and demand system.
Major carbon emitters use only a small amount of green electricity, with only TSMC accounting for over 1%.
A survey by the Taiwan Renewable Energy Alliance found that among the top 20 domestic carbon emitters in 2021, only a handful had installed renewable energy for their own use. TSMC had the highest percentage of green electricity, exceeding 4%, while other companies' green electricity usage was less than 1%. The next highest percentage was Sinopec, at approximately 0.87%, while CPC Corporation (Taiwan) ranked third, at approximately 0.14%.
A closer look at the TRENA report reveals that its data is sourced from various companies' public ESG reports. Due to varying levels of disclosure, calculation methods vary slightly. For example, TSMC only reported a global electricity consumption of approximately 16 billion kWh, which translates to 660 million kWh of green electricity used in Taiwan to arrive at a 4.11% figure. This differs from other companies' calculations, which use green electricity use in Taiwan divided by total electricity consumption there. For example, CPC Corporation Taiwan uses 1.6 billion kWh of domestic electricity consumption as the denominator and approximately 20 million kWh of green electricity generation as the numerator.
In response to this, TRENA Secretary-General Gao Ruping explained that the data from private surveys is limited by the companies' willingness to disclose information, and TRENA has repeatedly confirmed the accuracy of the figures with the companies.
Source: Environmental Information Center (https://e-info.org.tw/node/234827)
