Chairman Cho Young-tak of Korea Power Exchange (KPX). (Photo: KPX)

All coal-fired power plants, 30 years in operation, are to be dismantled and replaced with LNG-fired ones, and nuclear power units are to be scaled down, new/renewal energy sources are to be expanded to accelerate the government’s energy paradigm shift.

These plans are expected to be contained in the upcoming 9th national power supply master plan. A working group on the establishment of the 9th national power supply master plan and the Korea Power Exchange (KPX) announced a draft version of the national power supply master plan and provided key takeaways.

Prof. Yoo Seung-hoon, chairman of the group’s overall subcommittee, said they discussed ways of accelerating a shift into eco-friendly power generation like a more dramatic reduction in coal-fired power generation under preconditions power supply should be stabilized.

Prof. Yoo said a dramatic reduction in coal-fired power generation will be pushed. All coal-fired power plants, reaching 30 years after they were put into operation, will be dismantled by 2034 and they will be replaced with LNG-fired ones. According to the draft plan, these policies are forecast to result in tearing down 30 coal-fired units, half of the 60 thermal power plants, now in operation.

Out of the coal-fired units, to be dismantled, 27 units with a combined capacity of 12.7GW are to be replaced with LNG-fired ones to stabilize power supply.

The portion of nuclear power generation will likely peak at 27.3GW with 26 units, to be in operation in 2024, and after the year, the figure is predicted to decline to 19.4GW with 17 units, to be operated in 2034.

The capacity of newly built new/renewal energy facilities is likely to be expanded to 62.3GW to meet the supply goals of the 3rd energy master plan as planned.

As a result, combined facility capacity is predicted to surge to 122.4GW by 2034, and the ultimate facility capacity is forecast to stand at 127.1GW to reflect a reserve rate of 22 percent. The government plans to expand the capacity of newly built LNG units to 4.7GW to make up for a shortage of power generation facility capacity.

In particular, a revised roadmap on greenhouse gas emission reduction, established in July 2018, showed that 10 coal-fired units would be dismantled in the 8th national power supply master plan to achieve greenhouse gas emission reduction goals in 2030, and 14 more coal-fired units are to be torn down in the upcoming national power supply master plan.

Power demand is forecast to be reduced compared to the 8th national power supply master plan, resulting in a decline in greenhouse gas emissions in the power generation sector.

If necessary, additional restrictions on coal-fired power generation will be enforced on top of a seasonal fine dust management regimen, which went into force between last December and March to achieve greenhouse gas emission reduction goals in the paradigm shift sector as planned.

The nation will discuss differentiated compensations according to rational evaluation and benefit levels to spur dispersed power generation.

It will consider introducing Korean virtual power generation to ensure systematic management in accordance with the expanded dispersed generation and integrating dispersed generation resources and the conventional power grid.