Last Year, 4.8GW of Renewable Energy Installed... Exceeding Targets for 4 Consecutive Years

Solar Power 4.4GW and Wind Power 0.1GW Distributed... Cumulative Renewable Energy Capacity Reaches 29GW

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Kwon Haeyoung] Renewable energy such as solar and wind power exceeded the initial target of 4.6GW last year, reaching 4.8 gigawatts (GW) in deployment. With this, the government has surpassed its targets for four consecutive years since establishing the 'Renewable Energy 3020 Plan' in December 2017.

The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced on the 5th that, according to a survey on commercial and self-use renewable energy deployment in 2021, solar power was provisionally tallied at 4.4GW, wind power at 0.1GW, and bio and others at 0.3GW.

As a result, the cumulative renewable energy capacity stood at approximately 29GW as of the end of last year. Specifically, solar power accounted for 21GW and wind power for 1.7GW.

Since the establishment of the Renewable Energy 3020 Plan, the newly deployed capacity over the recent four years (2018?2021) reached 18.2GW, a significant increase compared to 12.2GW at the end of 2017. In particular, solar power saw a new deployment of 15.6GW over four years, more than 2.4 times the cumulative capacity of 6.4GW at the end of 2017. Consequently, the share of renewable energy generation, based on commercial use, expanded more than twofold from 3.2% at the end of 2017 to about 6.5% as of October 2020.

The pace of renewable energy deployment has slowed. Due to strengthened site regulations to ensure safety, the deployment of solar power in mountainous areas decreased from 1.2GW in 2020 to 0.8GW in 2021, and wind power projects have been delayed due to complex permitting procedures and local acceptance issues. Accordingly, last year's renewable energy deployment volume decreased compared to the previous year (5.3GW). However, the annual wind power construction performance increased from 4 sites (120MW) to 13 sites (902MW), indicating that wind power deployment is expected to expand in the mid to long term.

The government plans to continue expanding renewable energy deployment by increasing the Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) ratio, which mandates the proportion of renewable energy supply by large power producers, to 12.5% in 2022. It will also support securing appropriate economic feasibility for project developers by expanding fixed-price contract bidding volumes and providing additional weighting according to offshore wind internal network connection distances. Furthermore, regulations and procedures related to renewable energy will be improved, including the enactment of the 'Wind Power Special Act,' improvement of local government setback distances, and analysis and provision of wind power site suitability.

An official from the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy stated, "We plan to actively pursue various policy efforts to deploy renewable energy necessary for achieving the national greenhouse gas reduction target (NDC) and carbon neutrality in the future," adding, "We will enhance local acceptance by expanding incentives for residents near power plants, increasing resident participation, and discovering and disseminating best practices in resident-participation power projects."

However, renewable energy such as solar and wind still faces the challenge of intermittency, as power generation varies depending on weather conditions. To transmit electricity generated from renewable energy, various power facilities must be equipped, and the cost of reinforcing the power grid is also a significant burden. The government estimates that 78 trillion won will need to be invested by 2030. The increased cost burden on power producers due to the RPS ratio increase will also be borne by Korea Electric Power Corporation, which is expected to intensify pressure for electricity rate hikes.

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