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　　• The latest update on COP21 and the survey of Taiwanese public's attitude toward climate change issues will be released in press conference.

　　• The center welcomes interviews on honored guests, which could be interviewed before or after the press conference, but approval should be obtained from the person.

　　• The center invites all pioneering journalists to come and report on the exciting content of the forum.

　　While the news coverage is all about elections, on 12th December during COP21 climate conference 195 countries reached a historic Paris climate agreement to stop global warming. In preventing the collapse of civilization within a century, all countries are going to gradually stop the use of fossil fuel (petroleum, coal, natural gas) in the coming decades so as to stop the pace of global warming. According to the latest statistics by IEA, Taiwan's CO2 emissions per capita is as high as 10.63 t CO2/capital, ranking 8th among countries with population of more than ten millions, and the level of emission has not improve at all since 2011. In this forum the press conference will release the first-hand information that relates to Taiwan about COP21, as well as the key statistics from the survey of Taiwanese public's attitude toward climate change.

　　The research center, in order to understand Taiwanese residents' willingness of carbon reduction, has rigorously carried out a public survey on Taiwanese people's attitude toward climate change, and the result is encouraging. With similar trend to global society, nearly 70% of respondents consider climate change as the major problem facing the world, and are very concerned of as well as willing to change the current economic situation as high pollution and high energy consumption. They think economic development can be pursued together with environmental protection and are willing to pay the price for developing renewable energy! Therefore, the government should, on the basis of such public opinions, make all-out effort to bring out economic transformation that addresses both economic development and environment protection!

　　1. On the aspect of addressing both economic development and environment protection, 69.0% of respondents think that environment protection helps foster economic development, and 72.0% do not think that environment protection would hinder economic development.
　　2. On the aspect of willingness to pay, 85.1% of respondents are willing to pay for safety reasons higher electricity price to develop renewable energy, with the percentages increasing by 3.5% compared to year 2012. As high as 68.8% of respondents are willing to pay higher tax to protect environment, increasing by 4.4% compared to year 2012. Only 37.7% of respondents agree that offering industries with petro and electricity subsidy would support economic development.
　　3. On the aspect of environment awareness and energy transition, as high as 86.9% of respondents agree with implementing environmental protection for future generations, 80.0% of respondents think that the air pollution problem is severe, 78.7% of respondents agree that alternative energy help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and 66.3% of respondents support replacing with natural gas. All the above statistics indicates public support for the government to save energy and reduce carbon emissions. The government should follow public opinion and spare no effort in pursuit of economic transformation that addresses both economic development and environment protection!

　　Climate change has directly affected Taiwanese economy and life styles. According to the year 2015 report by Standard & Poor's (S&P) on sovereign rating implications of natural disasters, Taiwan, for frequent earthquakes, is listed on the top 10 most vulnerable countries. People are now aware of the fact that climate change is striking Taiwan and the extreme climate directly caused by climate change. Taiwan sees more frequent natural disasters like drought and typhoons, and extending area at risk of epidemics. Agricultural production, traffic safety, disease prevention, and working patterns are all under attack. The current rules and regulations are barely able to respond to the impact such as typhoon day-offs, vacillating price of agricultural products, financial losses of roads and properties.

　　It is foreseeable that in the future years COP21 agreements on the requirements of carbon reduction on global trades will be put into force. Failing to meet the requirements, Taiwanese corporations would face trade barrier. For example, TPP is very likely to mandatorily request Taiwanese products must achieve the same standards on carbon footprints. According to the Climate Change Performance Index released by Germanwatch and CAN-Europe, an assessment of 58 countries, Taiwan ranks in the bottom ten despite that the rank has improved by 2 compared to last year. In terms of developing renewable energy, Taiwan showed a lack of progress and the room for improvement remains large. With Greenhouse Gas Reduction Act and Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) passed next year, the ranking for next year is expected to improve on the score of policies. Implementation is the mutual target for the government and people.

　　The latest update of COP21 and survey on Taiwanese people's attitude toward climate change is released in the press conference. This press release serves only as a summary of news, and does not represent the views of speakers.