by Jeong Ilwoong
Published 11 Apr.2023 08:58(KST)
Chungnam Province is set to establish an integrated testing and evaluation infrastructure for hydrogen vehicles.
On the 11th, the province announced that its project, "Establishment of a Performance Verification Platform for Hydrogen Commercial Vehicle Parts," was finally selected in the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy’s 2023 Automotive Industry Technology Development contest, enabling the province to build an integrated testing and evaluation platform for hydrogen vehicles.
The integrated testing and evaluation platform for hydrogen passenger and commercial vehicles will be the first of its kind nationwide and is planned to be established within the Automotive Center of Chungnam Technopark in Yesan-gun. The total project cost is 9 billion KRW, with the province receiving 5 billion KRW in national funding.
The purpose of this project is to build a performance verification platform for hydrogen commercial vehicle parts, which are expected to experience rapid growth due to strengthened environmental regulations and carbon neutrality initiatives in major global countries, and to support testing and evaluation.
The province expects that this project will accelerate support for the local automotive industry's transition to future vehicles.
The project will be carried out over four years from next month until December 2026 through cooperation among the province, Yesan-gun, the dedicated institution Korea Institute for Advancement of Technology (KIAT), and the lead organization Chungnam Technopark.
The detailed project components include ▲establishing five types of equipment such as power conversion devices for hydrogen commercial vehicle stacks ▲developing testing and evaluation methods for hydrogen commercial vehicle parts ▲supporting testing and evaluation of hydrogen commercial vehicle parts.
The province plans to build a forward and backward enterprise growth cooperation network and conduct mutual technological cooperation by linking with Jeonbuk, which was selected for establishing a real vehicle demonstration platform for hydrogen commercial vehicles in the contest.
Once the project is in full swing, the province anticipates economic ripple effects such as greenhouse gas reduction linked to carbon neutrality, securing industrial competitiveness in new markets, production inducement of 16 billion KRW, added value inducement of 12 billion KRW, and employment inducement of 64 jobs.
A provincial official stated, “We expect this project to lay the foundation for enhancing competitiveness in future core technologies and to help lead changes in the local automotive parts industry ecosystem. We will strengthen support to respond to paradigm shifts in the automotive sector, such as eco-friendly vehicles, so that Chungnam can leap forward as a hub of the future automotive industry.”
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.