CNA file photo

Taipei, Aug. 30 (CNA) Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Yang Wei-fuu (楊偉甫) secured approval from the board of directors of state-owned fuel supplier CPC Corp., Taiwan (中油) Wednesday to become the acting chairman of the firm after former CPC chair stepped down to take responsibility for a nationwide power outage earlier this month.

In a statement, CPC said that the company held a board meeting that afternoon to discuss Yang's nomination by the MOEA, and issued a greenlight for the nomination.

Yang, who remains in his MOEA position, assumed his new post soon after the approval was given, CPC added.

The meeting also approved a nomination by the MOEA to have Yang become one of the directors of the oil company's board.

Former CPC chairman Chen Chin-te (陳金德) tendered his resignation, which was immediately accepted by Premier Lin Chuan (林全), three days after the massive blackout hit the country on Aug. 15.

The outage, which left more than 6 million households in 17 cities and counties across Taiwan without electricity, took place after all six generators at the gas-fired Tatan Power Plant in Taoyuan shut down accidentally as a result of human error during maintenance work at a nearby CPC metering station.

The Tatan Power plant is the largest gas-fired power station in Taiwan, so the shutdown had a massive adverse impact on the country's power supply.

CPC noted that Yang has already been in charge of supervision of four state-owned enterprises, including CPC.

According to CPC, before becoming economic vice minister in January 2015, Yang had worked as director of the Water Resources Agency (WRA), director of the WRA's Central Regional Water Resources Office, deputy chief engineer of the WRA, and a section chief of the WRA.

Yang holds a master's degree in civil engineering from Colorado State University, CPC said.

Earlier Wednesday, Vice Premier Lin Hsi-yao (林錫耀) said in a meeting held by the Central Standing Committee of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party that the Cabinet is expected to soon release the results of a probe into the exact cause of the power outage. 

(By Huang Li-yun and Frances Huang)
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