EPA officials said yesterday that CPC should present a plan to avoid devastating the algae or change the route of the pipeline, although the pipeline construction project already passed environmental impact evaluation.

CPC will face fines or a suspension of the project if it fails to take proper action to protect the algae, EPA officials said.

The Taiwan Endemic Species Research Institute (TESRI) under the Council of Agriculture (COA) called for urgent action to protect the algae that has been growing for several thousand years.

Most algae on Taiwan's coastlines had been destroyed by industrialization and pollution in the past decades.

But the length of about 20 kilometers of calcareous algae on the coast of Kuanyin township in Taoyuan, including some clinging tightly on rocks or sand coast as high as one meters, is the most complete strip of such algae discovered so far in Taiwan.

Researchers at the TESRI said tests showed that some samples of live algae gathered in the area has been in existence for at least 2,000 years.

As living proof of the evolution and ecological changes of the western coastline of Taiwan, the algae should be carefully preserved for research and educational purposes, TESRI researchers said.

They pointed out that most of the algae along the Taoyuan shoreline have already been destroyed by industrial pollution or reclaimed land.

CPC's plan to build the LNG pipeline to connect the Tatan thermal power plant at the Kuanyin and Taichung areas will threaten the ecological environment for the strip of algae in Kuanyin area.

The researchers said adequate measures should be adopted to ensure the conservation of the extremely valuable natural resource.

CPC executives said the construction of the pipeline already passed environmental impact evaluation after the company revised plans to narrow the digging area for the pipe to a width of four meters from originally planned meters. They said environmentalist groups had suggested that the CPC move the projected pipeline to the south by 150 meters.

But CPC found it infeasible because the pipeline will run into artificial reefs created to breed fishery products in the suggested area.

All the CPC can do now is to do its best to minimize the adverse environmental impact to the algae when laying the pipeline, they added.