TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taipower Chair Tseng Wen-sheng (曾文生) said Monday the Cabinet will allocate NT$8 billion (US$250 million) to bury power lines along four coastal highways to protect the electrical grid from damage during severe weather conditions, per CNA.
The project comes in the wake of Typhoon Danas, which in July caused widespread power outages, affecting nearly one million households and toppling close to 2,500 utility poles in central and southern Taiwan. Taipower described the damage as one of the most severe levels on record.
Rebuilding the grid after such an event is a significant challenge. Each utility pole weighs over one tonne, requiring large machinery and crews to transport and install them while also clearing debris and fallen trees.
Tseng also announced a separate NT$2.2 billion for the general maintenance of the power grid and high-voltage transmission towers. Both budgets are set to be reviewed by the Legislative Yuan before Friday.
Taipower reports that Taiwan has nearly 3.2 million utility poles, with about 47.6% of power lines installed underground. Chen Ming-shu (陳銘樹), the company’s vice president, said that underground cabling enhances power capacity and reduces outages from natural disasters or external contact. However, it costs up to 12 times more than overhead lines and makes fault detection more challenging.
According to Taipower, the cost of building underground power lines can reach up to NT$200 million per kilometer. It explained that underground cables can cause voltage to rise due to a capacitive effect, requiring additional equipment such as reactors to stabilize the system, further increasing costs.
To ensure a stable power supply to Taiwan’s major science and industrial parks, the Cabinet also plans to allocate NT$20 billion to improve the resilience of transmission and distribution systems and to upgrade maintenance capabilities.
Taipower added that rapid growth in electricity consumption has put mounting pressure on the power supply in northern Taiwan. With the region’s dense population and high electricity demand, expanding new transmission infrastructure poses significant challenges. In response, it will prioritize replacing aging underground cables to boost transmission capacity.
