Seoul City's Electric Vehicle Budget for Next Year at 30% Level of National Subsidy (Supported by Ministry of Environment)

Oh Hyun-jung, Seoul City Council Member, Criticizes 2022 Electric Vehicle National Budget Temporary Notification Amount of 259.3 Billion Won; Only 43.6 Billion Won (30%) Allocated from City Funds

[Asia Economy Reporter Jong-il Park] Oh Hyun-jung, Seoul City Council member (Democratic Party of Korea, Gwangjin District 2), pointed out at the 3rd meeting of the Environment and Water Resources Committee of the 303rd regular session held on the 22nd that the 2022 Seoul electric vehicle (EV) supply budget is only about 30% of the temporarily notified national subsidy (tentative amount), and strongly demanded an expansion of the budget allocation for the EV supply project, which is a core policy of Seoul’s 2050 carbon neutrality.

The Ministry of Environment allocated 259.3 billion KRW (39,510 units) in national subsidies for EVs to Seoul in 2022, but Seoul only allocated 43.6 billion KRW (11,816 units), about 30% of that amount, while announcing plans to secure an additional 111.5 billion KRW (15,184 units) through a supplementary budget later.

Even considering the supplementary budget, Seoul’s EV supply target is only about 68% of the scale set by the Ministry of Environment.

Regarding Seoul’s supplementary budget plan for EV supply, Councilor Oh Hyun-jung criticized, “A supplementary budget is a budget prepared only when there are unavoidable reasons or unexpected expenditure factors,” and added, “The Seoul Climate and Environment Headquarters’ plan to prepare a supplementary budget for the remaining EV quantity is neither an unavoidable reason nor an unexpected expenditure factor, and is a manipulative act contrary to the original meaning of the supplementary budget, so it should be avoided.”

A supplementary budget is a budget that modifies an already established budget due to unavoidable reasons arising after the budget is established, prepared when unexpected expenditure factors occur, and executed with the consent of the council.

Recently in Seoul, there have been cases of excessive supplementary budgets issued without considering urgency and uncertainty, taking advantage of the COVID-19 situation, and there is an increasing number of cases where the city council criticizes projects that were budgeted through supplementary budgets but failed to execute the funds.

Furthermore, regarding the allocation of 180 million KRW for EV media promotion and the creation of an eco-friendly vehicle promotion center, Councilor Oh stated, “At this time when various EV models are very popular among citizens, EV promotion should be handled by manufacturers and sellers, and local governments should focus on expanding charging infrastructure,” and requested that this budget be used for promoting charging infrastructure instead.

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