Book celebrates Green Growth Alliance

By Kim Se-jeong

The Danish Embassy in Seoul and Korea’s Presidential Committee on Green Growth launched a book Saturday in celebration of a new bilateral alliance on green growth.

Titled “Green Partners,” the book offers a glimpse of 14 private Danish companies that do businesses in the renewable energy field, and share their efforts in reducing CO2 emissions in operation.

“It is the first product that celebrates the Green Growth Alliance,” said Thierry Hoppe, deputy head of mission at the embassy.

“The Danish experiences, many of which are reviewed in this booklet, show that the success of green growth requires all those efforts,” said Young Soo-gil, chairman of the presidential committee, during the book-launch ceremony at the Danish Ambassador’s Seoul residence, Saturday.

Young also hoped the book would serve as a useful source of information for Korean companies.

The Green Growth Alliance was born in May this year when President Lee Myung-bak and Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen met in Denmark.

The two agreed to “join efforts in promoting the political, commercial and technical developments” required for low-carbon green growth.”

Under the alliance, nine memorandums of understanding (MOU) were signed at both government and private levels.

The Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) signed an MOU for green growth cooperation on Global Green Growth Forum. GGGI is an international organization born in Seoul to support developing countries in their transition to a green economy.

The Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) and the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) also signed an MOU on establishing the Korea-Danish Green Technology Research Center in both countries.

A Danish delegation led by Minister of Climate and Energy Lykke Friis was supposed to attend the ceremony, but couldn’t make it due to a delayed flight.

The 14 featured companies are Maersk, Grundfos, Hempel, Lego, Svendborg Brakes, Oticon, H2, novo nordisk, JPS, kk-electronic Danfoss, Vestas, Aalborg Industries and novozymes.

Established in 1981, kk-electronic produces a control system for wind turbines.

Nearly 40 percent of the wind turbines around the world run on kk-electronic-made control systems. In Korea, a branch of the firm opened an office in 2009, and has a partnership with Hyosung Power & Industrial Systems, a domestic wind turbine manufacturer.

“We’d like to work together with Korean companies who aspire to become a leader in the wind energy market around the world,” the book said.

Denmark is one of the leading countries spearheading efforts to reduce CO2 emissions and making sustainable economic growth possible.

The government declared “Energy Strategy 2050” aiming at becoming fully independent of fossil fuels by 2050.

It promotes wind, biomass and biogas energy to replace coal, gas and oil-based energy, and feeds a private sector with subsidies.

By 2020, as a mid-term goal, the government is projecting to cover at least 60 percent of electricity consumption by renewable energy.

Korea has also made an ambitious plan.

The government announced a reduction target of 30 percent relative to a “business as usual” scenario by 2020. It also initiated a $ 38 billion “Green New Deal” which will subsidize and make investments in private companies.

A total of 1,800 copies of the book have been printed, and they will be distributed to private companies through the committee and the embassy.