Korea's tasks to reduce global emissions

By Troy Stangarone

When governments meet at the U.N. Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) in November they will face an increasingly difficult task in limiting global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century. Global temperatures have already increased by more than 1.0 degree Celsius and countries were not on track to meet their pledges from the Paris Accords prior to the pandemic. Now, as the world's economies begin to recover, the pandemic's brief reprieve from ever-increasing levels of carbon emissions is ending.

To an extent, this issue should not be surprising. While Korea and other countries have pledged to become carbon neutral by 2050, those plans will be phased in over time and the current focus is understandably on vaccinations and economic recovery.

The task before the world, in meeting the challenge of climate change, however, is enormous. The decline in carbon emissions from energy consumption last year was 6 percent. To meet the climate goals put forward in the Paris Accords, the world will need similar annual drops in emissions for the next three decades, according to an analysis by BP.

Meeting this challenge will require a significant deployment of new renewable energy sources. The International Energy Agency estimates that over the next decade, the world will need to add annually 390 gigawatts of wind power and 630 gigawatts of solar power. To put that amount in perspective, South Korea is set to build the world's largest offshore wind farm over the next decade and it will only provide 8.2 gigawatts of power. Much more will need to be done in Korea and other countries if the world is to stave off the worst effects of climate change.

In addition to wind and solar power, the world will need to scale up technologies that allow for the usage of renewable fuels, such as hydrogen. Korea is at the forefront of these efforts, with its Hydrogen Economy Roadmap Korea, but meeting the timeframes needed to shift to renewable energies, in order to limit increases in global temperatures, requires more international collaboration to scale up hydrogen as a new energy source.

Within the current roadmap, Korea is working to expand the use of hydrogen domestically and aims to have 5 percent of its power generated from hydrogen by 2040. However, a significant portion of Korea's focus has been on mobility. This focus will reduce carbon emissions and help to improve domestic air quality. For hydrogen fuel cell vehicles to be cost-competitive with internal combustion engine vehicles, however, estimates suggest that production needs to reach levels of 100,000 vehicles per year. The initial goal was to reach that level of production by 2025, but current sales figures suggest that those levels of production are further in the future.

While the Hydrogen Economy Roadmap envisions a significant portion of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles being exported, fostering the development of green hydrogen produced with renewable power will be key to promoting these types of vehicles successfully in markets abroad. Korea's hydrogen plan, however, primarily relies on grey hydrogen, which uses natural gas, a fossil fuel, to produce hydrogen, rather than water, which would be used in the green hydrogen process.

In Korea's domestic context, grey hydrogen makes sense. Dedicating renewable energy to the production of green hydrogen only becomes economically advantageous once there is an excess of renewable power domestically. With Korea lacking excess wind or solar capacity, the focus on grey hydrogen makes sense from a domestic perspective to promote the development of end-use applications.

However, a shift to green hydrogen would further reduce Korea's domestic emissions and demonstrate the viability of hydrogen-powered equipment in export markets. International collaboration could help to facilitate this shift. Partnering with Australia or Chile to tap into their efforts to develop the production of green hydrogen will not only support the development of green hydrogen in countries blessed with an abundance of potential solar power, but will also help to develop potential export markets for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and other technologies.

The benefits of international collaboration could extend to the shipping industry as well. Korea Shipbuilding and Offshore Engineering is one of three companies worldwide known to be developing a commercial liquefied hydrogen carrier. A more robust hydrogen economy outside of Korea will need a new fleet of ships that can handle the cold temperatures required to move hydrogen in its liquid form.

Some partnerships are already happening on the private level. POSCO, for example, is partnering with Fortescue Metal Group in Australia on green hydrogen, which will be needed to eliminate carbon emissions from steel production.

Developing an infrastructure for hydrogen in Korea is important for the development of a market for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and other fuel cell related technologies to reach economies of scale. However, for hydrogen to establish itself as a viable carbon-free fuel source, emphasis also needs to be placed on developing production in countries with significant renewable resources to produce green hydrogen.

Troy Stangarone (ts@keia.org) is the senior director of congressional affairs and trade at the Korea Economic Institute.