S Korea to pour USD 31bn in green energy sector - report

Nov 18, 2011 - South Korea plans to invest KRW 35.5 trillion (31bn/23bn) in renewable energy projects in a bid to have a 10% share of the global clean energy market by 2020, national daily Korea Herald reported yesterday.

Under a 10-year research and development (R&D) framework, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy will finance R&D programmes in the solar and the wind power, and in smart grid aiming to speed up technological advancement, commercialisation and exports, according to the daily.

The ministry will increase subsidies for small enterprises to 50% of its R&D budget by 2020 from 20% last year, targeting to have 50 green energy small and medium enterprises by 2020.

Through the framework, Korea also targets to raise its energy efficiency by 12% and reduce the CO2 emissions in the energy sector by 15% by 2020.

The government will provide KRW 18.2 trillion of the planned funding and the rest is expected to come form the private sector.

If successfully executed, the framework will result in KRW 202 trillion of export revenue, KRW 59 trillion of domestic sales and 914,000 new jobs in the green energy and energy efficiency sectors.

Korea also plans to increase the share of renewable energy in its total energy consumption to 11% by 2030 from 2.4 % in 2008, the daily added.

(KRW 100 = USD 0.088/EUR 0.065)

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