Green Energy Initiatives of President Lee Myung-bak

Carbon emissions is causing climate change, resulting in higher temperatures, more droughts, rising sea levels and more extreme weather. A low carbon economy and green growth envisage the integration of all aspects of itself from manufacture, agriculture, transportation and power-generation, etc., around technologies that produce energy and materials with little GHG emission. A low carbon technology is designed to prevent dangerous climate change, and to reduce the rate of consumption of finite global resources. Moving to a low carbon economy and green growth not only addresses an environmental imperative and technological developmental progress on energy, but it is also a new business achievement.

Globally, CO₂ accounted for 77 percent of total GHG emissions in 2004. Power generation, which includes both electricity and heat generation from fossil-fuel combustion, is one of the major sources of CO₂ emissions. In 2006, the CO₂ emissions from fossil fuel use alone accounted for 41 percent of total GHG emissions. Electricity generation is by far the largest single source of CO₂ emissions.

The total energy consumption in the world is expected to increase to 22 gigatons of oil equivalent (GTOE) per year in 2050, from the current 10 GTOE per year. Fossil fuels provide 70 percent of this total and non-fossil sources the other 30 percent. The non-fossil share is divided almost equally between renewable and nuclear energy. Consequently, energy-related carbon dioxide emissions will increase strongly to 39.5 GtCO₂ in 2025 and 55 GtCO₂ in 2050 from the 21.6 GtCO₂ in 2000.

The future of human prosperity depends on how successfully we tackle two central challenges; securing a stable supply of reliable and affordable energy, and  effecting a rapid transformation to a low-carbon, efficient and environmentally benign system of energy supply. It is essential to shift to energy sources that can substantially reduce CO₂ emissions compared with fossil fuels rather than concentrating energy-saving efforts on the existing energy portfolio. In this respect, clean energies like renewable and nuclear should be an important alternative.

Korea is a strongly developed industrial country with almost no local energy resources. About 96.5 percent of its energy needs were imported in 2008. For a decade, the Korean Government has been enforcing various policies in order to ease this domestic dependence from overseas energy resources. The current global economic recession spurred President Lee Myung-bak to announce a "Green New Deal - Green Energy Initiatives" where industrial development is based on eco-friendly and renewable energy technologies.

On Aug. 15, 2008 celebrating the 60^th anniversary of Korea's foundation, President Lee Myung-Bak declared a vision of "Low Carbon, Green Growth" as the new national vision to lead Korea's future development for the next 60 years. He envisaged a new development model he named "The Green Growth Policy." Green growth refers to the sustainable growth and development without endangering the climate. It is also a new national development paradigm that creates new growth engines and jobs with green technology and clean energy. In the vision of "Green Growth," green is a broader concept that transcends environment, while growth does not conflict with, but complements, the environment. Economic growth is not impairing, but improving the environment. The environment could be considered a new engine for economic growth.

The Green Growth Policy also envisages an ambitious plan to develop Korea as a green hub for the global market.

Salient Features of Green Growth Policy

(i)                 Sustainable economic growth

(ii)               Environmental sustainability

(iii)             Social development

Energy Issues

Korean dependency on overseas energy sources is about 97 percent, ranked fourth in the world in petroleum import. Korea's CO₂ emission rate is ranked sixth among OECD countries and first in term of growth rate. Although South Korea is a signatory of the Kyoto Protocol to combat global warming, it does not belong to the first group that has to cut carbon dioxide emissions by an average 5.2 percent below the 1990 level between 2008 and 2012. However, in the future, South Korea may be pressured to join the scheme from 2013.

To address issues pertaining to energy security and sustainable industrial development, President Lee announced a long-term strategy that will determine the direction of its energy policy until 2030. As the implementation blueprint for the vision, the Basic National Energy Plan suggests the realization of a 'low energy-consuming society' through the improvement of energy intensity to the level of 0.185 by 2030 from 0.341 at present. (Energy intensity is the energy volume (TOE) consumed for the production per each US$1,000 in GDP.) It also seeks independence from fossil fuels in the energy supply through a 4.6-fold expansion of the new & renewable energy ratio to 11 percent by 2030 from the present 2.4 percent, while reducing the fossil energy ratio (based on the primary energy level), including oil, to 61 percent by 2030 from 83 percent at present and addressing the climate change-induced environmental & socioeconomic issues.

The implementation plan also aims to raise the energy technology level, including 'green technology,' from the present 60 percent compared with advanced countries to the world-class level by 2030, nurture the energy industry into a growth engine and address all energy-poor classes, which currently stand at the 7.8 percent level. Energy-poor classes refer to those households with energy expenditures, including lighting and heating that exceed 10 percent of total household income.

Source: Ministry of Knowledge Economy

Table: 1 Estimated CO₂ emission in 2030 by fuel mix (mill. ton)

(CO₂ emission to be reduced by 52% in 2030)

Renewable Energies

The Korean government has announced a national renewable energy plan, under which renewable energy sources will account for a steadily increasing share of the energy mix between now and 2030. The plan covers investment, infrastructure, technology development and programs to promote renewable energy.

Table: 2 Future growth of Renewable Energy

(Source: Ministry of Knowledge Economy, 2008).

Table 3: Korea's R&D aims for Green Technology (Unit: trillion won)

(Source: National Science and Technology Council, Jan. 14, 2009)

The initiative will cost 111.5 trillion won (about $85.8 billion) between now and 2030, of which nearly a third will come from the government. In the R & D sector, the government will invest 11.5 trillion won (about $11 billion up to 2030) to support the green energy industries to develop green technologies. It will also establish a large-scale integrated test bed for green technologies and encourage energy-related national corporations to pursue green technologies. It is estimated that green energy industry will create about 950,000 new jobs (Source: Ministry of Knowledge Economy, 2008).

Furthermore, it is proposed that the government will support the development of green technologies to make renewable energy more cost-effective. The introduction of a Renewable Portfolio Standard in 2012 to support the construction of 1 million "green homes" between now and 2020, and the provision of incentives for the wider use of renewable energy sources in new and newly renovated buildings are also envisaged in the Vision Document.

(i) Solar Energy

With the steady technological gains and improvement in manufacturing, Korea is targeting the fast growing global solar energy market. Under the new government's long-term strategy with a motto of "Low Carbon, Green Growth," the solar cell industry will be nurtured as the new growth engine that can replace the semiconductor and display industries, which are major export products of Korea. For the last two years, Korea has recorded rapid growth in the PV industry. The value chain in the first generation solar cell has been accomplished. The existing and new companies have reported expansion plans of their production capacity of poly-silicon feedstock, ingots & wafers, solar cells & modules and production equipment. The second generation thin-film solar cells were successfully commercialized in 2008. Many companies have been considering business entry in the field of silicon, CIGS and dye sensitized solar cells. Big conglomerates are also encouraged to invest and install solar power generation plants to realize the target by 2030.

It is argued that with the present pace and the right amount of state support, Korea will be able to generate 4 gigawatts of electricity through solar power in 2020, and increase this to 20 gigawatts in 2030. Exports will correspondingly go up to 1.4 trillion won ($1.48 billion) in 2020 and over 6 trillion won in 2030.

(ii) Wind Energies

Korea has much potential in the wind power market because it is surrounded by the sea and has secured a high level of marine construction technology. For the electricity supply target, wind generation is expected to provide the largest contribution (up to 25 percent or 5.2 TWh) of the total generation 20.5 TWh by new and renewable sources in 2011. To achieve this goal, the government is providing attractive incentive programs such as the 15-year guaranteed feed-in tariff, tax incentives and subsidies for the local wind market. Encouraged by the strong government support of R&D programs, several big companies have been participating in wind turbine development projects including component localization. However, the Korean wind farm business is still behind schedule and has been slow so far for several reasons, which include public acceptance issues, difficulty in getting permits for grid connection and limited sites because of mountainous onshore characteristics. Coping with all these barriers, more than 550 MW of capacity is currently under development (scheduled through 2009) according to construction permit statistics at the end of 2007.

In 2007, the added installation capacity of wind energy was of only 18 MW. Despite barriers such as complex terrain at onshore sites, the Korean wind generation capacity target of 2,250 MW by 2012 is a very ambitious goal.

Nuclear Energy

Nuclear energy, which emits nearly no greenhouse gas or pollutant, is recently receiving keen attention as the most suitable alternative energy source for the high oil-price era. Amid a rapidly expanding global nuclear energy market, the Korean Agency for Technology Standards (KATS) plans to promote the Nuclear Energy International Standardization Project until 2011 in order to prepare a foothold to advance as a strong nuclear energy nation. The nuclear energy industry in Korea is experiencing a second nuclear energy renaissance. The Nuclear Energy International Standardization Project aims to turn the Korean nuclear energy industry into a major export industry like semiconductors and automobiles. For overseas expansion of nuclear energy industries, it is very important to develop new technologies and to have existing advanced technologies adopted as international standards. Furthermore, Korea plans for expansion and investment in its nuclear energy portfolio to meet the domestic target of 27.8 percent by 2030 from 14.9 percent in 2007.

In conclusion, President Lee Myung-bak announced a very ambitious development model named "The Green Growth Policy" of green growth with low carbon emissions. "Low carbon, green growth" is a national vision that envisages sustainable growth and development without endangering the climate. Clean energy is the central theme of the developmental model. The success of the Green Growth Policies will facilitate Korea to develop as a green hub for the Global Market. The mobilization of resources and favorable public acceptance are the most imperative factors to realize Korea's development policies in renewable energy and environmental technologies.