TAIPEI, Taiwan, April 12 (UPI) -- Taiwan's fourth nuclear power plant is nearly operational.
Taiwanese Premier Jiang Yi-huah is scheduled next week to visit the NPP in New Taipei to review the plant's equipment and systems that are nearly ready to come online.
Cabinet spokeswoman Cheng Li-wun said that Jiang will also be briefed on a safety inspection plan that is being instituted at the NPP, adding that the visit will be open to the media, CNA news agency reported on Friday.
Nuclear power in Taiwan has become an increasingly contentious issue in the wake of the March 2011 disaster at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi six reactor NPP complex, with many Taiwanese fearing that a typhoon or tsunami could wreak similar havoc on Taiwan's four NPPs, all located on the shore's edge.
The nearly completed new NPP has been causing debate between the Taiwan's pro-nuclear government and anti-nuclear activists who want the facility mothballed before it becomes operational due safety concerns and questions on how its nuclear waste will be treated, all of which is currently stored on site at Taiwan's NPPs.
