Air pollution in Taiwan

According to the EPA Department's Deputy Director, Chang Shuenn-chin (張順欽), this pollution is primarily caused by fugitive dust found at the riverbanks during the low-flow season of winter.

This can later be washed downstream by torrential rains during the summer thereby increasing the likelihood for land collapse and mud slides, which in turn creates dust on riverbanks.

[8] Based on data from 2016, the Environmental group Air Clean Taiwan claimed in 2017 that Kaohsiung's Zuoying District, Yunlin's Lunbei Township and Pingtung were amongst the worst affected city (districts) in the country, with Lunbei topping the list regarding high levels of PM2.5, often prompting the red and purple alerts issued by the EPA.

The data showed that during the last decade, the average annual mean concentration of NO2 in Taiwan had equally surpassed the European Union limit value of 40 micrograms per cubic meter, every consecutive year.

The EPA concluded that air pollutants brought in from China by strong winds was directly responsible for drastically rising the detected concentration levels of particles under 2.5 micrometers in diameter (PM2.5) at close to all of Taiwan's seventy-six monitoring stations.

During those winter months, short-term health hazards due to the northeastern winds included mild symptoms of eye irritation, sneezing or coughing.

[5] Epidemiological statistics also show that the short-term increase of air pollutant levels during the winter coincide with sudden spikes in hospitalization for cerebrovascular disease.

[7] With regards to spikes in PM10 particles concentration during periods of strong winds in the winter, fugitive dust and phenomena such as earthquakes, typhoons and other domestic geographical or meteorological factors must be taken into account.

During warnings by the scientific community about increasing prevalence of lung cancer in Taiwan in December 2015, it was claimed that Taichung Power Plant, along with the Sixth Naphtha Cracking Plant of the Formosa Plastics Group account for roughly seventy percent of the air pollution in the Central Taiwan region of the country, emitting large quantities of sulfur oxides.

[11] In 2014 a study by Academia Sinica's Research Center for Environmental Changes claimed that, due to the burning of ghost money (also known as Joss paper) and incense during religious ceremony days (occurring mostly on the first and 15th days of the lunar calendar month), values of PM10 particles at large temples are at five to sixteen times the normal value of a regular household's environment.

Equally, due to the burning of ghost money and incense, the households of communities with a nearby temple show an increase in PM2.5 particles value at an average of 15.1 micrograms per cubic meter.

[13] In hopes of rectifying this issues, in 2017 Taiwan Healthy Air Action Alliance launched the "Anti-Air Pollution and Blue Sky Parade".