Kim Jung-hwan, Professor of School of Energy Systems Engineering, Chung-Ang University
Why should Korea achieve "Carbon Neutrality”?
In accordance with the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, carbon credit systems are already being implemented worldwide to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It doesn't matter whether climate change is real or caused by carbon dioxide. The reality we must face at this point is that Europe and the United States, the world's two largest markets, have created a new order with the goal of being carbon neutral. This is because Certified Emission Reduction (CER) is a tariff imposed by countries with sufficient renewable energy on those that do not.
Is it possible for Korea to realize “Carbon Neutrality by 2050”? We are curious about the plan for realizing carbon neutrality in your opinion.
There could be various scenarios, but a production-based country that lacks renewable energy such as Taiwan or Korea may have to shift production for export to countries such as Europe or the United States that are rich in renewable energy. In addition, Southeast Asia, which has emerged as a new global production base, may lose its advantages as a production base. This is due to the cost of building a power grid that mixes new and renewable energy and existing power generation facilities. Gradually, countries such as the United States and those in Europe – and China in the not-too-distant future – countries with abundant renewable energy generation, will prosper as market and production base countries. On the other hand, underdeveloped/developing countries may become poor again. And this poverty gap will be a factor in preventing carbon neutrality. Lack of new and renewable energy causes underdeveloped countries to give up their exports, which inevitably leads to further poverty and will push them to continue use of fossil energy sources that have become cheaper. In the end, it will lead to a failure of basic global carbon reductions.
How will “Carbon Neutrality by 2050” affect the Korean economy in the future?
Another important point – in some ways the simplest solution – is that we cannot completely ban the export and use of oil itself. Norway, Europe's largest oil producer, exports crude oil extracted with renewable energy as carbon-neutral crude oil. Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, is proposing a hydrogen transition strategy. As carbon- neutral crude oil, hydrogen, or fossil fuels will continue to be used, global renewable energy production will increase. However, there may not be as much change in economic structure or technological strategy in the carbon-neutral era as we think.
Among the policies of developed countries that are actively practicing carbon neutrality, are there any policies that Korea can accept?
The Norwegian policy, as I have just mentioned, suggests that energy policy should be designed for the sake of countries’ interests. Europe’s largest oil-producing country enacted a law to ban internal combustion engine vehicles first and declared 100% conversion to new and renewable energy. In other words, while making money by selling oil, they are 100% switching to abundant new and renewable energies such as wind power and are putting pressure on production base countries equipped with automobile companies that produce internal combustion engines with carbon credits. Growing and selling rotten apples, earning money, and paying fines from supermarkets for buying and selling your own rotten apples. This is an absurd strategy that can maximize the national interest anyway, and what we should look into.