Taiwan’s reliance on imported energy is seen as its most critical weakness if a conflict breaks out with Beijing, and experts warn a prolonged blockade could paralyse the island within days.
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Those concerns deepened after Taiwan shut down its last nuclear power plant in May, and an August referendum to restart it failed. As debate continues over renewables versus fossil fuels, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) government has little room to manoeuvre.
At the heart of the problem is Taiwan’s dependence on liquefied natural gas (LNG) and crude oil imports, much of it from Qatar – a supplier with close ties to Beijing. Nearly half of Taiwan’s electricity is generated from LNG, and both its coal and LNG supplies are fully imported.
With only limited storage capacity, the risk is clear.
“This reality does not just pose a risk to the reliability of the grid but creates a strategic liability,” the Washington-based think tank Foundation for Defence of Democracies (FDD) said in a September 4 report.
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It said Beijing’s “heavy use of cyber-enabled economic warfare, selective maritime quarantines and diplomatic pressure on Taiwan’s energy providers would allow China to easily put Taiwan in extremis, undermining societal resilience and compromising continuity of the economy”.