By Sarah Wu
HSINCHU, Taiwan (Reuters) – Taiwan’s chip industry is ready to work with the government to achieve its 2050 net-zero goal but development of new energy sources needs to be hastened as demand for artificial intelligence booms, a top industry executive said on Friday.
Taiwan imports almost all its energy needs, mostly in the form of natural gas and coal, but has embarked on a big push for more renewable energy to achieve its carbon neutral target.
Cliff Hou, a senior vice president at the world’s largest contract chipmaker, TSMC, said AI offered an opportunity rarely encountered in decades.
Energy stability is key to the development of the industry, Hou, the chairman of the Taiwan Semiconductor Industry Association, told its annual meeting in the chip hub of Hsinchu.
Last month, the association made four key appeals to the government, among them the stable supply of green energy, to help chip companies exploit the AI trend, Hou said.
“In terms of energy, we hope that the government can, in every aspect, more actively develop new energy sources and maintain the stability of supply to the semiconductor industry,” Hou added.
Both industry and government agree on co-operating on clean energy and the industry is willing to co-operate in achieving the goal of net zero by 2050, Hou said.
“But here we have encountered several challenges,” he added. “The supply of net-zero energy currently lags the demand of our entire semiconductor industry. We hope that the government can speed up the pace of developing new energy sources.”
In 2021, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) said it aimed to reach net zero emissions by 2050, matching a government target set that year by President Tsai Ing-wen.
Coal’s contribution to Taiwan’s power mix is set to fall below 30% by 2025, with the share of LNG rising to about half and renewables to a fifth, according to government plans.
(Reporting by Sarah Wu; Writing by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
