Korea District Heating Corp. (KDHC) is firing on all cylinders to implement low-carbon, green growth projects during the second half of this year, KDHC officials said.

KDHC is striving to pursue sustainable low-carbon, green growth by spreading district heating and cooling services, and developing new and renewable energies.

First of all, KDHC plans to expand the number of multi-unit dwellings to be covered by district heating during this year to 1,213,000, up 3.1 percent from 1,177,000 in 2011. Buildings with district heating will rise to 1,961 in 2011, up 2.7 percent from 1,910 in 2011, while air conditioned structures will increase from 363 to 388.

KDHC believes that it will have no problem in achieving this year’ s goal of expanding district heating since 340,000 units in Gwanggyo, Gwangju/Jeollanam-do innovation cities, Sejong City, Dongtan in Hwaseong City, and Gajaeul New Town have already been providing district heating, a KDHC official said. 

KDHC is also pushing for expanding district cooling. The company plans to raise the portion of structures with district cooling after securing its price competitiveness over its rival fuel, gas. KDHC said it would consider lowering district cooling prices following gas cooling price fluctuations. 

KDHC plans to carry out a pilot project to develop and experiment with desiccant cooling systems suited to multi-unit dwellings. The corporation said it raised the efficiency of desiccant cooling by employing desiccant cooling technologies suited to a real living environment. It has already test-operated desiccant cooling technologies in 40 newly-built apartment units from this past June. 

District cooling has a lot of strengths, including energy savings from the use of the existing heating pipelines, the lowering of electricity peak load during summer, and an increased utilization rate of combined cycle power plants.  

KDHC is also aggressively carrying out new and renewable energy projects. 

In this regard, the corporation aims at producing 1.85Gcal of heat and 10,606MWh during this year, having an effect of cutting 562,775 tons of CO2 emissions and substituting 1.5 million barrels of crude oil imports. The greenhouse gas emissions translate into the amount produced by some 140,000 households, which will have an effect of substituting some 170 billion won worth of crude oil imports.  

KDHC plans to build a combined cycle power plant using refuse-derived fuel (RDF), being recycled from urban garbage in the Gwangju-Jeollanam-do Innovation City, which has a capacity of 19.7MW+46Gcal/h, in the second half of this year. It will be applied to the construction of combined cycle power plants using biogas, including a 3MW-class one in Mapo, Seoul, a 2MW-class one in Samsong, and a 1MW-class one in Ilsan. 

The corporation plans to build a 5MW expansion using palm sludge to the existing combined cycle power plant in Gangnam and to produce palm sludge overseas. 

It is focusing on meeting the renewable portfolio standards (RPS) system that has gone into effect this year. 

KDHC plans to participate in a joint project to construct a 5MW-class photovoltaic power plant in Jeollanam-do and a joint 12.5MW-class wind power project with the private sector. 

The corporation is considering combined cycle power plants combining fuel cells at the precincts of its branch offices and it is seeking the establishment of a joint venture to build a 43.6MW-class power plant recycling waste heat emitted by the Donghae Plant of Ssangyong Cement Ind. Co. Ltd.