By Yoav Cerralbo
The threat of climate change requires an urgent response, according to many politicians, but it also offers opportunities for economic growth as new industries are slowly developed.
Yet a country’s carbon footprint goes hand-in-hand with its economic development, just as with Korea during the last half century.
“Korea developed really fast but as a result of this rapid development, we have created quite a lot of carbon dioxide, so we are trying to reduce this by reducing the emission of carbon dioxide directly and by changing the paradigm of growth,” Han Seung-soo, former prime minister and chairman of the Global Green Growth Institute, told The Korea Herald.
Today’s industries rely heavily on fossil fuels to power economic growth and prosperity, but Han believes that changing the current paradigm to one that relies more on renewable energy will propel Korea to become one of the leaders in the green growth revolution.
30 percent reduction in emissions
President Lee Myung-bak pledged that Korea would reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 30 percent below projected levels by 2020 during his address at the Copenhagen climate change talks in 2009.
“Of course the national business community was not very happy that we announced this but we have to do this,” he said. “Korea is the only country which has adopted a policy of reducing carbon dioxide greenhouse gases by 30 percent.”
Han added that since then, the business community has stopped worrying and started cooperating due to the long-term benefits of the industry now in its embryonic state.
While the green technology to power massive economies like Korea is still out of reach, Han believes that in the meantime nuclear technology is the way to go.
“We have to have clean energy and at this juncture we are trying to invest heavily in new and renewable energies such as solar, fuel cell, wind and tidal,” Han said. “That can take maybe 20 to 100 years (to be viable and fully operational on a large scale), so until then we think that the only alternative is nuclear energy.”
Nuclear answer
Because of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, many countries have either put aside their nuclear aspirations for energy purposes or, like Germany, will move their economy completely away from nuclear power.
Han said that this was not the answer. Instead, Korean industries and the government will work on upgrading the safety of nuclear power plants.
Both Lee and the International Atomic Energy Agency see eye-to-eye on the matter, agreeing recently on the issue of safeguarding nuclear power plants against worse-case-scenarios.
“So we will invest heavily in this area also,” said Han.
Another strong sector that shows promise for internal and external consumption is an electric mass transit system currently being developed by Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.
“Although this is a very small step, but compared to 20 years ago, the air is cleaner in Seoul,” he said while discussing the level of pollution posted on the electronic air quality measuring board in front of Deoksu Palace.
“I saw that Seoul air is as clean as Busan air but there is still a lot to be done,” he noted.
Green growth industry
About four years ago, when green growth was suggested by Lee and other world leaders, hopes were raised for a new growth engine to propel the world’s economy out of the global recession.
Instead, countries bickered over the processes to implement multilateral mechanisms to reduce carbon emissions.
Han said that the green growth industry is an alternative concept to be here for the next hundred years and that the next step will be to replace the existing energy delivery system originally developed during the industrial revolution 150 years ago.
“This is the beginning of the green growth revolution. It will take time. Korea is the first country that implemented green growth as a policy, and we are in the process of trying to transfer some of the knowledge we have accumulated to other countries -― this is the third year of our first, five year plan.”
Han added that the general public should not expect too much out of a three-year old green growth paradigm.
“But I think this is the only alternative to the existing growth paradigm so we have to make it succeed,” he said.
Alternative energy
While Korea is experimenting with solar panel energy production, the challenge that remains is the amount of land available, of which the nation is in short supply.
Also, Han would like to see the government subsidize the cost of solar panels for home usage instead of subsidizing fossil fuels.
“If we really want to have solar, we need to go outside of Korea to Mongolia or Libya where we can lay out solar panels in the desert. Otherwise I think that the future of solar energy in Korea is very minimum,” he said.
Wind is also another area of interest, but again, unlike the Nordic countries, the wind is not strong enough to power high intensive industries in Korea.
“So at this juncture, nuclear energy which supplies 36 percent of our electricity generation is the only alterative,” he said.
Multilaterally, it doesn’t look good
As for the Durban climate change talks at the end of November, Han is not very optimistic that the processes to implement an accord to replace the Kyoto Protocol will be hammered out in time.
“As it stands, it’s too late. Even if we agree on certain modalities then it will be very difficult to implement that modality by January 1, 2013 because you have to pass ratification at parliament which takes generally 2-3 years.”
Also, the big energy emitters such as the United States, China, France, Russia and Korea will all hold elections for their leaders come next year.
“Leaders are very reluctant to make wise decisions looking into the future, they are more concerned about short term solutions to the demands made by their citizens.
“Climate change is not a short term problem it’s a long term problem,” he said.
(yoav@heraldcorp.com)