TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The effects of a 7.2 quake at 7:58 a.m. on Wednesday (April 3) had an immediate impact on 308,242 households and businesses that were left without power.
Economic Minister Wang Mei-hua (王美花) said power plants and substations were affected by the earthquake, creating a type of domino effect as feeder lines from generation facilities to distribution systems tripped, causing unit shutdowns in many of the areas hit by the earthquake. Hualien, the epicenter of the earthquake, experienced the most power outages.
Following Hualien, another hard-hit area was Taichung, which also experienced serious power disruption. Taipower workers rushed to the affected areas and attempted to restore power as soon as possible, per UDN.
Taipower said a majority of the power outages began at generating stations and substations, causing feeder lines to trip, which resulted in a drop in frequency. Many of the generators and substations have been restarted and the system has now stabilized.
As of 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, 70% of the 308,242 households affected by power outages in the morning have had their electricity restored. Some 87,132 households, however, are still waiting for power to return
The list of power-generating plants that temporarily tripped included privately-owned plants such as Kuokuang Power Plant Unit 1, Heping Power Plant Unit 2, and Haihu Power Plant’s two gas turbines. And for publicly owned facilities, Taipower’s Taichung Power Plant Unit 8 and Unit 10, and Tongxiao Power Plant’s Unit 5 steam turbine also tripped.
Everything at the nation’s nuclear power plants continued to operate normally. As for transmission lines, all 345kV lines are operating normally, four 161kV lines tripped, and five 69kV lines also tripped.
As for the earthquake’s impact on state-owned Taiwan Water and CPC Corporation, Wang said a visual inspection of facilities revealed no damage, though in-depth testing with instruments would be necessary.