South Korea's new president has a chance to clean up
In common with recent elections in Canada and Australia, it's a rebuke of leaders on the right who've fought a rearguard action against the transition to renewables. Lee has promised to phase out coal, limit use of natural gas and accelerate the building of wind and solar. His position on nuclear power, a major success story that was strongly supported by his impeached predecessor Yoon Suk Yeol, remains ambiguous.
However, resolving energy policy in South Korea won't be easy. Years of inertia and obstruction of the transition have left the country with a system that's plagued with high costs and has the lowest renewable penetration among developed economies.
State-owned utility Korea Electric Power Corp., or Kepco, is wallowing in debt after it was forced to suppress bill prices when Russia's invasion of Ukraine pushed up the cost of liquefied natural gas. In the best of times, it usually depends on government subsidies to sell electricity for less than it spends on fueling, building and servicing its plants.
The biggest challenge will come from fixing the crippling costs of renewables. South Korea pays more for its wind and solar than any other major economy. It's the only significant market where you can still build a new coal power plant more cheaply than a new solar or wind generator.
If Lee's plans for an energy transition aren't going to become mired in red tape while adding yet more costs to Kepco's teetering balance sheet, it will be slow, unrewarding work. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer came to power last year promising to build 1.5 million homes in five years by breaking through a similar morass of regulatory roadblocks. Homebuilding this year, however, is expected to hit its lowest level in 14 years.
The barriers to renewables are legion. Some are natural: South Korea is as densely populated as the Netherlands, but its land is far more mountainous. That means a dearth of the flat sites best suited to solar and wind. The few that exist have to contend with a farming sector that aims to be largely self-sufficient in growing rice for the country's 52 million people. Hillsides where solar can be built are vulnerable to landslides, particularly as a warming climate causes more intense downpours. There are no grid connections to other countries, because South Korea doesn't much trust its neighbors.
The more serious barriers are the effect of regulatory capture, though. One little-noticed update from Kepco and the powerful Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy last year largely outlawed new renewable development for seven years in a swath of the south and east, saying fresh generation licenses wouldn't be issued in the region until 103 electricity substations complete their upgrades in 2032.
Similarly, onerous rules requiring solar developers to verify the carbon footprint of their panels throughout the supply chain were introduced in 2021 following concerns that Chinese modules were undercutting local manufacturers. That's helped prop up the local industry, but left the country with some of the highest module costs in the world. The carbon footprint of a grid that gets 60% of its power from fossil fuels seems to have been less of a concern.
Lee's more vocal backing for offshore wind is a sign of how intractable these problems may be. It's the least price competitive form of clean energy in South Korea, but in a country where the rural lobby is opposed to onshore solar and wind and the green lobby wants a halt to further nuclear development, it's the one that's least likely to upset any interest groups.
For all that, Lee has some advantages. The center-left has had control of Seoul's executive and legislative branches for just two years since 2008, from 2020 to 2022 when policy was dominated by COVID-19. He's now got that power, giving him a stronger hand in allowing more renewables onto the grid. Kepco's weakened financial state should mute its objections, too.
He will need to move fast, though. Three under-construction nuclear generators near Ulsan and on the east coast must be expedited, while the red tape that's held back solar and wind will need to be slashed. If Kepco needs more bailouts, they should be conditional on it upgrading transmission networks to open up the windy, sun-baked east of the country as a renewables hub.
Even costly offshore wind has potential, if prices can be brought down by shortening current decadelong development times. Costs for the technology in the U.K. fell by two-thirds between 2014 and 2019 as the sector grew. There's no reason South Korea can't repeat the trick.
David Fickling is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering climate change and energy.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Japan Times
an hour ago
- Japan Times
Osaka Expo ticket sales exceed break-even point
Ticket sales for the ongoing World Expo in Osaka have exceeded 18 million, the break-even point for operating costs, organizers said Monday. About 18.09 million tickets had been sold as of Friday, according to the Japan Association for the 2025 World Exposition, which aims to sell 23 million tickets. Weekly sales have been 400,000 to 500,000 tickets since the April 13 opening of the Expo. Before the opening, ticket sales were sluggish and there were concerns that the Expo would end in the red. But the Italian, U.S. and other foreign pavilions have proven popular, while the event is receiving favorable social media reviews. The operating costs of the Expo is estimated at ¥116 billion ($785 million), with ¥96.9 billion expected to be covered by admission fee revenue. But unexpected expenses may arise. The park and ride system, which the Expo introduced to allow visitors to transfer from private cars to shuttle buses to access the venue, may lose several billion yen because of initial low usage, a senior association official said. In addition, a Japanese government official warned that if the venue is closed due to weather conditions, losses will reach ¥600 million per day. "Selling 18 million tickets is only one passing point. At this point, I can't say that we will be profitable," another senior association official said.
Japan Times
2 hours ago
- Japan Times
Xi looks to tighten grip after scandals shake China's military elite
Outwardly, China's military has never been stronger. Its naval ships venture farther across the oceans. Its nuclear force grows by about 100 warheads every year. Its military flights around Taiwan are increasingly frequent and intimidating. Every few months, China unveils new weapons, like a prototype stealth fighter or newfangled landing barges. Internally, though, China's military is experiencing its most serious leadership disarray in years. Three of the seven seats on the Central Military Commission — the Communist Party council that controls the armed forces — appear to be vacant after members were arrested or simply disappeared. That internal turbulence is testing President Xi Jinping's effort, going back more than a decade, to build a military that is loyal, modern, combat-ready and fully under his control. Xi has set a 2027 target for modernizing the People's Liberation Army, or PLA, and also — according to some U.S. officials — for gaining the ability to invade Taiwan, which Beijing claims as its territory. The current wave of investigations and removals has reached some commanders handpicked by Xi, suggesting recurrent problems in a system that he has tried for years to clean up. In the first years after Xi came to power in 2012, he launched an intense campaign to clean up corruption in the military and impose tighter control, culminating in a big reorganization. "When Xi Jinping sees his own men making mistakes, he is likely to be especially furious,' Joseph Torigian, an associate professor at American University who has studied Chinese leaders' relations with the military, said of Xi. "Control over the military is so existential. It's inherently explosive. That's why any sense of stepping out of line has to be crushed.' The most jarring absence in the military leadership is that of Gen. He Weidong. The second most-senior career officer on the Central Military Commission, He has disappeared from official public events and mentions — an unexplained absence that suggests he, too, is in trouble and may be under investigation. Another top commander, Adm. Miao Hua, who oversaw political work in the military, was placed under investigation last year for unspecified "serious violations of discipline,' a phrase that often refers to corruption or disloyalty. He was among around two dozen, if not more, senior PLA officers and executives in the armaments industry who have been investigated since 2023, according to a recent tally by the Jamestown Foundation. Chinese President Xi Jinping gestures during the opening remarks of the 25th European Union-China Summit at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on July 24. | REUTERS Both men had risen unusually quickly under Xi's patronage. While Chinese officials are vulnerable to investigations for corruption or disloyalty even in the best of times, for him to lose them both reveals an uncommon degree of top-level upheaval. "The purges may have affected the working of the bureaucracy. It can also create a broader skepticism about the readiness of the Chinese military within the leadership,' said Ely Ratner, who had been an assistant secretary of defense in the Biden administration. Xi's ultimate fears for the Chinese military come from questions of battlefield preparedness, and anxieties that commanders could drift away from absolute loyalty to him and the party. Xi may seek a fourth term as leader of the Communist Party in 2027, and he will need to replace retiring or purged commanders with a new cohort whose devotion to him is beyond question. Recent official statements point to a renewed drive to reinforce ideological control. The Central Military Commission issued new rules last month aimed at "fully eliminating toxic influences, and restoring the image and authority of political officers.' A series of front-page commentaries in the Liberation Army Daily — the main newspaper of the Chinese military — urged PLA political officers to observe absolute loyalty. Since Mao Zedong's era, the military has served not only as a fighting force but also as a lever of political control for Chinese leaders, as their ultimate protection against potential rivals or popular uprisings. In internal speeches to the military throughout the earlier years in his rule, Xi praised the army for standing by party leaders during the 1989 military crackdown on pro-democracy protests, according to a volume of his speeches to the military published in 2019. But in such speeches, Xi has also repeatedly cited the lessons of Xu Caihou and Guo Boxiong, the two most senior former PLA commanders who were arrested for corruption nearly a decade ago. If the rot in the Chinese military elite had been left to spread, "our forces would have become a private army under certain people, an armed force turning against the party,' Xi told a Central Military Commission meeting in 2018. There are no signs that the recent turbulence in the military amounts to concerted defiance of Xi. But even relatively few cases of corruption or mismanagement could erode the trust between Xi and his commanders, said Joel Wuthnow, a senior research fellow at the National Defense University in Washington who studies China's military. Xi is the only civilian party leader who sits on the Central Military Commission, which ensures his singular power over the military. That also means that he cannot turn to other civilian officials to help him. "Xi would have to rely on commanders to develop options and implement them based on a huge amount of information and technical skills,' Wuthnow said. "If he's unable to verify that those people are honest, professional and competent, then I think his appetite for war goes down because: How can he be sure of the outcome?' An anti-landing drill — part of the Han Kuang military exercise in Bali in Taiwan on July 27, 2023 | Lam Yik Fei / The New York Times The purges are likely to disrupt coordination, weaken confidence in commanders and prompt Beijing to be more wary of considering an amphibious assault on Taiwan, M. Taylor Fravel, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wrote recently in Foreign Affairs. "The high intensity kinds of operations that would be involved in an invasion of Taiwan, or a blockade of Taiwan — pretty much anything that would happen under the shadow of U.S. involvement — I think will be impacted for a period of time by these problems,' Fravel said in a telephone interview. But the need to act strongly in a crisis against foes might override any doubts about combat readiness, Fravel said. If Xi felt that a war on Taiwan was necessary, he would most likely not hesitate to send his armed forces into battle, whatever the gaps in the top command, Fravel said. As if to make that point about resolve, Xi has pushed China's forces to perform increasingly demanding operations, such as the recent exercises by two aircraft carriers and accompanying warships in the western Pacific. An intercontinental missile test that arced over the Pacific last year appeared partly intended to send a similar message of resolve. "There is no detectable delay or scaling back,' in Chinese naval operations, said Andrew S. Erickson, a professor at the U.S. Naval War College. Next month, Xi will preside over a military parade in Beijing to showcase China's forces and his authority over them, when the party commemorates the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, which China celebrates as its victory over Japanese conquest. In the lead-up to the parade, the Chinese state broadcaster released a new documentary series called "Storming the Fort' that depicted the armed forces as primed for combat. "When the party tells you to do something, you sure do it,' an infantry officer says. This article originally appeared in The New York Times © 2025 The New York Times Company
Nikkei Asia
4 hours ago
- Nikkei Asia
South Korea and Vietnam leaders agree to increase trade, investment
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, right, stands with Vietnamese top leader To Lam at the presidential office on Aug. 11 in Seoul. © Reuters STEVEN BOROWIEC and MAI NGUYEN August 11, 2025 15:55 JST SEOUL/HANOI -- The leaders of South Korea and Vietnam agreed on Monday to seek deeper cooperation in fields such as nuclear energy, high-speed railways and critical minerals as their countries seek to upgrade bilateral ties.
