Government Establishes Low-Carbon Policy Foundation... Accelerates Clean Production and Resource Recycling Projects

Approval of the Amendment to the Act on Promotion of Transition to Environmentally Friendly Industrial Structure at the Cabinet Meeting

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Kwon Haeyoung] The government is accelerating the promotion of low-carbon and eco-friendly projects such as clean production and resource recycling in line with the 2050 carbon neutrality goal.

On the 12th, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced that the amendment to the "Act on the Promotion of Transition to Environmentally Friendly Industrial Structures," which includes legal support grounds for companies' low-carbon and eco-friendly promotion projects and measures to revitalize the circular economy, was approved at the Cabinet meeting. The circular economy refers to an eco-friendly economy that maximizes resource utilization value in all processes including raw materials, design, production, and resource recycling.

The amended law includes grounds for promoting clean production projects (Clean Factory) to reduce pollutants such as greenhouse gases, fine dust, and waste at manufacturing sites. The scope of eco-industrial development projects, which improve environmental and economic efficiency by exchanging or recycling by-products and waste heat among companies, has been expanded from within industrial complexes to companies outside the complexes.

Additionally, a provision defining the circular economy was newly established, and grounds for supporting circular economy activities throughout the entire product process, including raw materials, product design, and production processes, were specified.

New grounds were also established to promote urban mines of metal resources such as rare metals. Urban mines refer to the recovery of metal resources accumulated in waste and their resupply as industrial raw materials.

Furthermore, to activate "remanufacturing," which involves disassembling, inspecting, and reassembling used products to maintain their original performance, the notice limiting target items to 87 was abolished, allowing remanufacturing for all items.

Taking this legal amendment as an opportunity, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy plans to expand the support budget for circular economy-related technology development, process improvement, and new business discovery from 24.4 billion KRW last year to 43 billion KRW this year. To ensure smooth implementation of the institutional improvements, the ministry will provide guidance on legal changes and actively promote the circular economy industry.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.