Lai Must Own Taiwan's Nuclear Pivot as the DPP Faces Reality

When Taiwan's President Lai Ching-te (賴清德) floated the idea of restarting the island's second and third nuclear power plants — with regulatory submissions to the Nuclear Safety Commission expected before the end of the month — the political fallout was immediate. Opposition figures from the Kuomintang and Taiwan People's Party welcomed the shift while mocking the ruling Democratic Progressive Party's abrupt departure from one of its most sacred commitments. Pro-DPP voters, however, were far less forgiving. Some accused the party of cynically manipulating the anti-nuclear movement, while others demanded to know what had become of Lai's principles. More measured voices argued that submitting a proposal to the commission is not equivalent to an actual restart, noting that any real reversal would not take effect until 2028 or 2030 at the earliest, leaving room for course correction. Others called for a full national debate on energy policy to begin anew. （Related： Taiwan Announces Delivery Of First Two MQ-9B Unmanned Aerial Vehicles ｜ Latest ）

Lai now finds himself attacked from all sides, mocked by the opposition, and viewed with feelings of betrayal by his own base. What his supporters have largely failed to reckon with, however, is the energy reality that made this moment inevitable. Prolonged adherence to a nuclear-free policy has left Taiwan Power Co. and CPC Corp. without the tools to plan coherently, threatening the island's energy resilience amid acute regional instability and Middle East supply tensions. The irony is particularly sharp regarding former President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文). Tsai disregarded the results of a 2018 public referendum that favored retaining nuclear energy, and she presided over the policies that brought Taiwan to this juncture. While Lai faces the wreckage, Tsai has been campaigning with DPP candidates ahead of local elections, touting the promises of her tenure. She may well be relieved; the nuclear-free vision she spent years building has begun to unravel less than a year after she left office, but the crisis is now firmly Lai's problem to manage.

Lai's difficulties stem not merely from changing policy direction, but from refusing to acknowledge that he is doing so. His response to criticism that he is abandoning the DPP's most hallowed commitment was a strained claim that Taiwan had already achieved its nuclear-free goal for 2025. The implication — that ten months of continuing Tsai's policy was sufficient to declare victory — did not wound Tsai directly, but it outraged the party's most loyal supporters.

To navigate the backlash, Lai restated three preconditions for restarting nuclear power: safety assurance, a solution for nuclear waste, and a broad social consensus. This framing allows him to argue that he has not violated DPP principles or broken campaign commitments, offering anti-nuclear supporters the convenient rationale that a regulatory review is not a definitive decision to restart. Because the timeline from submission to actual operation stretches from two to five years, the nuclear question will almost certainly become a centerpiece of the 2028 presidential election. （Related： Taiwan Announces Delivery Of First Two MQ-9B Unmanned Aerial Vehicles ｜ Latest ）

This gives the DPP room to maneuver depending on shifting political winds. In this light, the referral to the Nuclear Safety Commission appears less like a sincere policy pivot and more like a calculated bid for centrist voters. It raises a critical question: Has the DPP's nuclear-free position ever been a genuine conviction, or has it always functioned as an electoral instrument — a sacred symbol invoked when convenient and quietly sidelined when necessary?

The history of Taiwan's anti-nuclear movement is instructive. Anti-nuclear sentiment became embedded in DPP politics as early as 1989, when activist Lin Jun-yi argued that opposing nuclear power was inseparable from resisting authoritarian rule. Throughout the 1990s, the construction of Taiwan's fourth nuclear plant, known as Nuclear Four, triggered repeated legislative battles. Lin Yi-hsiung (林義雄), one of Taiwan's most revered democratic figures, undertook hunger strikes and religious pilgrimages in protest, though his original demand was for a public referendum on the plant rather than its outright cancellation. （Related： Taiwan Announces Delivery Of First Two MQ-9B Unmanned Aerial Vehicles ｜ Latest ）

When the DPP came to power in 2000, Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) announced the suspension of Nuclear Four's construction within months, before legislative consultations had concluded. The move triggered a constitutional crisis. The Council of Grand Justices ruled that the Executive Yuan was required to report major policy changes to the legislature and obtain its consent. The legislature subsequently passed a resolution demanding the immediate resumption of construction. Eventually, an agreement was signed to resume the project, with the explicit proviso that Taiwan would pursue a nuclear-free homeland as its ultimate long-term goal. From that moment onward, the nuclear-free pledge functioned less as a rigid policy commitment than as a mechanism for managing political opposition.

The saga of Nuclear Four did not end there. During Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) eight years in office, Lin Yi-hsiung repeatedly demanded a public referendum on the plant. Although a referendum law was passed in 2004, Nuclear Four was never put to a public vote. When the KMT returned to power, Lin launched another hunger strike in 2014. The administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) capitulated within days, announcing that Nuclear Four would be mothballed pending a referendum. Lin, however, rejected the high threshold required to pass a referendum, demanding instead that construction simply halt.

Under Tsai, the referendum threshold was lowered, and nuclear energy was finally put to a public vote. In 2018, a measure framed as using nuclear energy to support renewables passed, deleting the statutory deadline that required all nuclear plants to cease operations by 2025. Yet, the vote was not sufficient to revive Nuclear Four. The first and second nuclear plants were decommissioned during Tsai's tenure, and the final reactor at the third plant was shut down shortly after Lai took office — an event Lai himself publicly celebrated as the achievement of the nuclear-free goal. （Related： Taiwan Announces Delivery Of First Two MQ-9B Unmanned Aerial Vehicles ｜ Latest ）

Lai's current awkwardness runs deeper than a simple policy reversal. His appointment of Asus Chairman Tung Tzu-hsien (童子賢), a prominent advocate for nuclear energy, as a government adviser signaled this shift well in advance. Yet, his justification stands in sharp contrast to the political courage shown by Chang Chun-hsiung during the 2000 crisis. Chang plainly declared that he would not evade responsibility for executive decisions or transfer authority to the legislature. Lai, conversely, has framed the reversal as a matter of following the legislature's lead, claiming the executive team is simply governing in accordance with the amended Nuclear Regulation Act.

This framing is deeply problematic. The amendment to the Nuclear Regulation Act — passed last May to allow nuclear plant operators to apply for license renewals after expiration — was fiercely attacked by the DPP at the time as a gift to Beijing, with some party figures claiming it would ease the path for a Chinese military takeover. Less than a year later, Lai is citing the exact same law as the legal basis for restarting nuclear power without explaining the glaring contradiction. （Related： Taiwan Announces Delivery Of First Two MQ-9B Unmanned Aerial Vehicles ｜ Latest ）

Lin Jun-yi once described his anti-nuclear stance as resistance to political, technological, and expert authoritarianism. Today, that framework can be applied in reverse. The DPP's handling of nuclear policy reflects a kind of institutional authoritarianism, one in which professional and technical judgment has been progressively squeezed out of the decision-making process. Former DPP legislator Lee Wen-chung (李文忠) has called for a genuine national debate, acknowledging that the arguments delivered by party representatives regarding the extension of the third nuclear plant were alarmingly inadequate. The roots of this inadequacy lie in how the methods of early activists — self-imposed silence, hunger strikes, and acts of personal sacrifice — transformed nuclear opposition within the party from a rational policy position into an unchallengeable dogma.

Tsai Ing-wen was often described as the least ideologically rigid DPP leader, yet she lacked the political will to challenge the party's nuclear commitment. It is worth noting that this commitment never reflected a genuine social consensus. When Chen halted Nuclear Four, the DPP governed without a legislative majority; when Tsai governed with a majority, the public voted in favor of retaining nuclear power. Lai, regarded within the party as its most committed independence advocate, may in fact be the figure best positioned to retire this three-decade-old symbol without triggering an irreparable political rupture. But to do so, he must be willing to take full ownership of the decision. No one else can absorb this political cost on his behalf — not the activists of the past, not Tsai Ing-wen, and certainly not his political rivals. （Related： Taiwan Announces Delivery Of First Two MQ-9B Unmanned Aerial Vehicles ｜ Latest ）