Production was disrupted at several companies in science parks and other industrial areas in southern Taiwan on Thursday, when the power went out across most of the country, but some of them have since resumed operations.
Contract chipmaker United Microelectronics Corp. (UMC) was one of the major companies that reported an interruption of operations, saying a voltage drop had brought production lines to a halt at its plant in the Tainan Science Park during the widespread power outage, which occurred shortly after 9 a.m.
Since then, however, most of its equipment at the Tainan plant has been gradually put back online, and production has resumed, UMC said.
In the neighboring city of Kaohsiung, flexible printed circuit board maker Flexium Interconnect Inc. said production at its plant in the science park there had ground to a halt due to the power outage, while Chang Wah Technology Co. said its plant was running on a backup generator.
The Southern Taiwan Science Park (STSP) administration, which manages the Kaohsiung and Tainan science parks, said the latter had suffered a power supply drop, which had affected some of the companies there.
Some companies in Kaohsiung were also hit by a disruption of their water supply, which was linked to the power outage, while others have been running on backup generators, the STSP said.
As of press time, parts of southern Taiwan were still without electricity, hours after the power had been restored in most of the country.
According to the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA), the problem was caused by an equipment malfunction at Kaohsiung’s Hsinta Power Plant early Thursday, resulting in the sudden loss of about one-third of Taiwan’s power supply and causing outages in more than 5 million households and businessplaces across the country.
Among them, 48 industrial parks were affected by the blackout, and power had been restored to 36 of them, as of Thursday afternoon, but work was being done to supply the other 12, the MOEA said.
Ten of the 12 industrial parks, which are in Taichung, Kaohsiung and Pingtung, house some 700 companies, according to Liu Chi-chuan (???), operations management deputy director at the Export Processing Zone Administration.
Liu said that in total, 521 companies in the southern Taiwan industrial parks were affected by the blackout, and power had been restored to 358 of them as of 1 p.m. Thursday.
Meanwhile, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said its operations in Taiwan had not been affected by the power outage, although some of its plants had experienced a voltage drop.
Winbond Electronics Corp., a dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chip supplier, also made a similar statement.
The two companies are based in Hsinchu, where the Science Park administration said none of its six satellite parks — Hsinchu, Zhunan, Tonglu, Longtan, Yilan and Hsinchu Biomedical Parks – had been impacted by the power outage.
The Central Taiwan Science Park administration also reported that its companies had not experienced any problems as a result of the blackout.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel