The Bureau of Energy should promptly designate a fairway for ships sailing off the nation’s west coast or reviews of offshore wind farm projects would be impeded, Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) Deputy Minister Chan Shun-kuei (詹順貴) said yesterday.

Offshore wind farm developers are required to pass environmental impact assessments by the end of this year to obtain approval for construction.

The wind farms farther from the coast should be built first, the EPA said in its strategic environmental assessment in December last year.

However, the fairway near the proposed wind farms has yet to be demarcated and the bureau failed to publish the fairway by the end of last month.

The fairway would be published by the middle of this month at the latest, a bureau official said at the EPA’s ad hoc committee meeting yesterday.

The fairway would affect the positioning of wind turbines, Chan said, adding that the bureau should not create more time pressure on the EPA as it reviews numerous offshore wind farm projects.

Six wind farm projects to be built off the coast of Changhua County were scheduled to be reviewed yesterday, but a developer withdrew its application.

Originally planning to build wind turbines off the Changhua Coastal Industrial Park (彰濱工業區), Wpd Taiwan Energy Co yesterday said it had notified the bureau of its plans to cancel its application for an environmental impact assessment on Wednesday last week due to “new environmental impact factors.”

The EPA has become more careful about protecting the habitats of Taiwanese humpback dolphins and it published a new chart of their habitat last week, a company representative said, adding that the company is evaluating whether to scrap the project.

Developers of the other projects are required to submit environmental analyses about migratory birds, dolphins and whales, among other documents, by the end of October.