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Special Reports
The Marshall Islands, one of the
TaiwanICDF’s partner countries in the
South Pacific, is constrained by limited
natural resources and has to import
fossil fuels from overseas to support
its needs in terms of transportation
and power generation. As a low-lying
country, the nation is also threatened
by rising sea levels. Faced with the
double jeopardy of climate change
and severely fluctuating international
oil prices, the Marshall Islands needs
to adopt development measures as
quickly as possible so as to adapt to
this increasingly severe environmental
challenge.
Promoting Solar Energy to Provide
Energy and Alleviate Pressure
The photovoltaic technology used
in generating solar energy is user-
friendly and scalable, and can serve the
needs of homes and small-scale power
distribution stations.
Such technology is better
than diesel in terms
of power transmission
costs and unfavorable
ene r gy l osses , bu t
is easily affected by
weather, resulting in an
unstable power supply
unsuitable for serving as a base load
power source. It can, however, serve
as an auxiliary energy source, and
thus solar photovoltaic systems are
appropriate for an island nation that is
generally reliant on diesel generators,
but which also needs to generate power
for home use in rural areas isolated from
the main power grid.
With solar photovoltaic power
generation able to solve the predicament
faced by the Marshall Islands, the
Marshalls Energy Company proposed a
project to the TaiwanICDF in hopes that
we would provide funding to support
the installation of grid-connected solar
photovoltaic systems and replacement
of energy-saving home appliances,
which, in addition to increasing energy
efficiency, could also reduce the
country’s fossil fuel consumption.
The TaiwanICDF subsequently
dispatched personnel to the Marshall
Islands to conduct on-site inspections
and visit the relevant stakeholders,
learning more about their needs and
views. We also drafted in consultants
and experts from the Ministry of
Economic Affairs’ Bureau of Energy
and t he I ndus t r i a l Techno l ogy
Research Institute’s Green Energy and
Environment Research Laboratories to
preliminarily establish
the feasibility of the
pro j ec t , t o ensu re
t h a t t h e Ma r s h a l l
I s l a n d s ’ c l i m a t e
a n d e n v i r o nme n t
are suitable for the
development of solar
powe r, t o con f i rm
that the Marshalls Energy Company
possesses the ability to maintain
operations, and to gain a better
understanding of stakeholders’ needs
and views, as well as to continue to
help the Marshalls Energy Company in
strengthening the project’s sustainability
at the design stage.
The Ta i wan I CDF succeeded
in incorporating Marshall Islands
government agencies such as the
Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of
Resources and Development and the
Marshall Islands Development Bank,
to jointly participate in the promotion of
the project, making its implementation
arrangement all the more rigorous. In
total, the TaiwanICDF will provide US$4
million in loans for the benefit of around
350 households, with Marshall Islands
authorities forecasting the reduction of
fossil fuel consumption in the household
sector by 14 percent. We believe
that this will ease the environmental
pressures faced by the Marshall Islands
and consolidate the close ties between
Taiwan and this partner country.
14
Forecasted reduction of
fossil fuel consumption in the
household sector
%
Energy Efficiency and Solar System
Project, Marshall Islands
Case Study
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