Lessons Learned from Taiwan Large-scale Rail Transportation BOT Projects

[[abstract]]近20年來，政府為充分利用民間資金，技術及經營效率積極推動民間參與投資公共建設之方式稱為PPPs(Public-private-Partnership)。其目的在減輕政府財政之負擔同時提升公共服務之品質，採用PPP方式辦理公共工程是開發中或已開發國家皆有越來越明顯之趨勢，不但帶動公共建設之活絡更激發學者之對PPPs議題研究之興趣，自1998年以來，已發表之許多學術文獻資料中PPP之相關著作其數量有日益增加之情形，其內容多數偏重在探討 BOT成功關鍵因子、選商機制、風險管理、政府採購及投資環境等領域，而研究報告中大多聚焦於BOT 之議題之片段，少有個案從計畫開始之選商、興建乃至營運階段整個生命週期之驗證， 本研究以台灣高鐵計畫(THSR)及台灣首次以BOT辦理之高雄捷運系統(KRT)兩個軌道系統運輸計畫為個案研究，結果發現，政府採用BOT方式辦理公共工程時經常專注在提供有效之誘因鼓勵民間投資，並轉移大部分之風險給民間企投資人，但以台灣高鐵從開始之選商策略採取以政府投資最少為最高指導原則，使甄選期間評審委員因名目價格之困惑而忽略其他評審準則，議約過程中修改條約之關鍵文字及允許核心之機電設備之變更，使高速鐵路BOT招標之公平性備受爭議，施工時又因歐系與日系新幹線機電系統間之認證問題而延遲完工一年，議約期間增加三方合約(tripartite)之簽定，其結果使政府陷入背負財務風險，在高雄捷運BOT專案中因政府投資大部分之非自償部分之建設經費，工程成本反而增加而施工品質則下降，因此當政府決定以 BOT方式辦理重大型運輸BOT計畫時，主辦機構應體認BOT專案執行過程中所產生興建或營運困境時，政府將無法逃避，且必須承擔所有之風險，否則將損害全民之利益，兩大型軌道BOT案其運量之預估與實際營運之運量差距甚大，造成收入短少而無法正常營運，因此，當一個政府或城市辦理重大公共工程BOT計劃之特許廠商發生重大財務風險時，其結果非單一特許廠商得以管控，因此當政府決定以BOT方式辦理重大公共工程時，於計畫之可行性階段主辦單位應邀請各領域之專家評估其計畫之財務、工程建造、營運、法律等專業顧問協助專業審查，使計畫得以執行順暢，以合理之風險分擔為原則，政府並隨時承受因特許廠商無法履行合約需求之風險，此乃大型公共建設(PPPs)成功之要件。[[abstract]]Since the early of 1990’s Public-private Partnership (PPP) the scheme of using private funding and the technology creative ideas and management ability of the private sector to satisfy the infrastructure needs has attracted more and more attentions and has been world-wide regarded as an innovative way to deliver public works Many studies have been made on the areas of the critical successful factors the selection criteria and the problems during the implementation of PPP scheme However most were made theoretically or based on the fragmentary information collected from certain phases of real cases Few have been made through examining the whole process of a project from the beginning concessionaire selection stage to the operation stage This study to address this shortage the two largest Build-operate-transfer (BOT) projects in Taiwan Taiwan High Speed Rail (THSR) and Kaohsiung Mass Rapid Transit (KMRT) have been used as study cases Conclusions were made based on the information collected from the written documents and in-depth interviews with people involved in the projects The findings of the this study show that (a) while the use of PPP becomes the government’s policy due to a limited amount of public-sector capital available although there is a sound procurement system with comprehensive concessionaire selection criteria the soundness of the whole proposal is easily be neglected and price becomes the sole criterion; (b) as the project is critical to the development of a city or even the entire country the government will be forced to compromise and grant the change of contract terms such as: the change of the E&M system the tripartite loan agreement and the compulsory purchase clause whenever the concessionaire encounters difficulties so as to ensure that the project can proceed smoothly; (c) the political interference arising from the huge amount of government investment seriously affect the project performance; (d) the huge financial loss caused by the over optimistic estimate of traffic volume in the government’s feasibility study and the financial proposal submitted by the concessionaire has seriously endangered the normal operation of the concessionaire The research results further suggest that since the risks of the large-scale infrastructure project are too big to be handled by the concessionaire alone the government should reasonably allocate the risks and always be prepared to involve or even take over the project whenever the concessionaire fails to fulfil the contract requirements so that the purposes of PPP will be obtained and the public interests will not be jeopardize