South Korea\u2019s vital statistics<\/p>\n
On a cool early morning on South Korea\u2019s east coast, Eunbin Kang pointed to a monument to a vanishing era.<\/p>\n
The 2.1GW Samcheok Blue power plant which came online in South Korea in January looms out of the headlands above a beach made internationally famous by a K-pop album shoot. It is expected to emit 13m tonnes of CO2 annually, while its lifespan could stretch beyond 2050, the year by which the country has pledged to reach carbon neutrality<\/a>. The country was building coal-fired power plants, said Kang, an activist who heads the Youth Climate Emergency Action<\/a> group and relocated to this city to oppose the facility, \u201ceven as the climate emergency demands an immediate halt to fossil fuel expansion\u201d.<\/p>\n But Samcheok is not an outlier. It is a symbol of the stark climate contradiction at the heart of the world\u2019s 12th largest economy<\/a>, celebrated for its technological prowess in semiconductors and electric vehicle batteries, yet among the top ten worst global climate performers.<\/p>\n Despite South Korea\u2019s impressive climate pledges to reach net<\/a> zero by 2050<\/a> with a 40% reduction in emissions<\/a> from 2018 levels by 2030, fossil fuels still dominate its energy mix: 60% of electricity comes from coal and gas, while renewables make up just 9%, a quarter of the OECD average of 34%.<\/p>\n The Samcheok Blue power plant, expected to emit 13m tonnes of CO2 annually. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Monopoly strangling transition<\/strong><\/p>\n At the heart of South Korea\u2019s climate failure is an energy model based on a state monopoly and central planning. Korea Electric Power Corporation (Kepco), the state-owned energy company, controls transmission, distribution and retail, while its subsidiaries dominate generation, creating structural challenges for competitors. These include Korea South-East Power, Korea Western Power and four other generation subsidiaries that together operate the vast majority of the country\u2019s coal, gas and nuclear power plants.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, renewable energy developers face an obstacle course of regulatory barriers. Until recently, windfarm developers had to obtain 28 different permits from multiple ministries in a bureaucratic maze<\/a> which created years of delays and significantly increased project costs, making many otherwise viable developments financially unfeasible. Progress was made in early 2025 with the passage of a long-awaited bill aimed at streamlining approvals, although the law won\u2019t take effect until 2026<\/a>.<\/p>\n Grid connection remains another hurdle. While electricity demand has grown<\/a> by 98% over the past two decades, the transmission network has expanded by just 26%, but attempts to expand the grid have led to bitter local conflicts.<\/p>\n In Miryang<\/a>, South Gyeongsang province, the government tried to compel residents to sell up to clear space for transmission towers and people faced violent crackdowns<\/a> during a six-year standoff. Currently, a dozen such projects are stalled<\/a> in the country.<\/p>\n K-pop fans in Samcheok with banners calling for an end to the power plant owing to its negative impact on the environment. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty ImagesProtest banners against the Samcheok Blue were erected at Maengbang Beach, which residents fear will be ruined by the plant. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/p>\n In February 2025, the National Assembly passed<\/a> a Power Grid Special Act aimed at expanding transmission. But civic groups warn<\/a> the law reinforces the country\u2019s decades-old top-down model of infrastructure development, removing what few safeguards remained around public consultation and environmental review.<\/p>\n \u201cWe fully acknowledge that renewable energy transition requires transmission lines,\u201d says Kim Jeong-jin from Friends of the Earth in Dangjin, where one project faced more than 10 years of delays due to local opposition. \u201cBut the repeated conflicts arise because the electricity is not even for local use, yet it causes damage to our region without any regard for our voices.\u201d<\/p>\n The country\u2019s energy strategy is guided by the Basic Plan for Electricity Supply and Demand<\/a>, a 15-year forecast revised every two years<\/a>. But the framework, which dates back to the 1960s, still prioritises centralised, large-scale power generation \u2013 a model built for coal and nuclear, and fundamentally incompatible with today\u2019s decentralised, flexible renewable technologies.<\/p>\n Graphic<\/a><\/p>\n Political volatility worsens the problem. Each five-year presidential term brings a policy reversal. For instance, in 2017, President Moon Jae-in announced a nuclear phase-out<\/a>; his successor, the now disgraced ex-president Yoon Suk Yeol, reversed course five years later<\/a>. This whiplash undermines any long-term planning for renewables \u2013 a problem faced by democracies around the world.<\/p>\n The consequences are stark. After Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine sent fossil fuel prices soaring, Kepco incurred enormous losses. In 2022 alone, South Korea faced an extra 22tn won (\u00a311.9 bn) in LNG power costs. Yet the government kept electricity prices artificially low<\/a>, a political choice that pushed Kepco\u2019s debt to a staggering 205tn<\/a> won (\u00a3111bn) by 2024.<\/p>\n The former president Yoon Suk Yeol reversed the plan to phase out nuclear. Photograph: Anthony Wallace\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Despite this crisis, meaningful reform remains elusive. This entrenched monopoly system has effectively blocked the clean energy transition, with independent renewable producers struggling to gain meaningful access to a market dominated by fossil fuel interests.<\/p>\n Carbon-intensive by design<\/strong><\/p>\n More broadly, South Korea\u2019s postwar rise relied on energy-intensive industries: steel, petrochemicals, shipbuilding and semiconductors.<\/p>\n \u201cThis structural dependency on heavy and chemical industries makes the energy transition extraordinarily difficult,\u201d says Park Sangin, a professor of economics at Seoul National University. \u201cThese industries are deeply embedded in the country\u2019s economic fabric and require vast amounts of stable, cheap electricity.\u201d<\/p>\n Powerful chaebols, or family-controlled conglomerates like Posco, Samsung and Hyundai, exert outsized influence on national policy. Their operations are supported by an electricity market designed for industrial stability, not climate mitigation.<\/p>\n The Hyundai shipyard in Ulsan, South Korea. Conglomerates exert outsized influence on national policy. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/p>\n And the problem isn\u2019t just domestic; South Korea also finances and provides the infrastructure for fossil fuels globally. South Korean shipbuilders dominate the global market<\/a> for LNG carriers. Public financial institutions also bankroll overseas fossil fuel projects.<\/p>\n One that was recently approved<\/a>, the Coral Norte gas project in Mozambique, is projected to emit<\/a> 489m tonnes of CO2 across its lifecycle. At the same time, South Korea has emerged as one of the world\u2019s top importers<\/a> of Russian fossil fuels, even as other nations cut ties.<\/p>\n \u201cThis financing directly contradicts [South] Korea\u2019s climate targets and makes a mockery of the Paris Agreement,\u201d says Dongjae Oh, the head of the gas team at Solutions for Our Climate (SFOC). \u201cIt exposes the country\u2019s hypocrisy \u2013 adopting climate targets at home while funding climate destruction abroad.\u201d<\/p>\n Even climate-friendly institutions continue backing fossil fuels. The National Pension Service (NPS), one of the world\u2019s largest pension funds, remains a major investor in coal and gas projects, despite a 2021 \u201ccoal-free\u201d declaration<\/a>. Three and a half years after this announcement, NPS only finalised its coal divestment strategy in December 2024, with a timeline that will delay implementation for domestic assets until 2030.<\/p>\n Wolsong nuclear power plant in Gyeongju, South Korea. The country\u2019s national energy plan still prioritises coal and nuclear power. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty ImagesSmoke rises from an industrial complex in Ulsan. South Korea\u2019s largest polluters made over 475bn won from selling unused carbon credits. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Meanwhile, South Korea\u2019s market-based climate policies have failed to drive meaningful change. The emissions trading scheme (K-ETS) was supposed to put a price on carbon when it launched in 2015.<\/p>\n But the system, which hands out free allowances to the largest companies, has instead created perverse incentives<\/a>, according to campaign group Plan 1.5. The group carried out an analysis and found that South Korea\u2019s 10 largest polluters have made over 475bn won (\u00a3258bn) from selling unused carbon credits between 2015 and 2022. The system that was meant to make polluters pay has instead rewarded them.<\/p>\n Next generation fights back<\/strong><\/p>\n There is growing awareness of a climate crisis as the country begins to experience increasingly severe weather. In 2023 46 people died in floods<\/a> that displaced thousands. More recently, torrential rains<\/a> have again caused at least 26 deaths<\/a>, followed by a record-breaking heatwave<\/a>.<\/p>\n In March this year devastating wildfires swept across more than 48,000 hectares (118,610 acres) \u2013 roughly 80% of the area of Seoul \u2013 killing 31 people<\/a> and destroying thousands of homes. The country\u2019s disaster chief described the situation as \u201ca climate crisis unlike anything we\u2019ve experienced before\u201d.<\/p>\n The prime minister, Kim Min-seok, has described<\/a> the climate crisis as \u201cthe new normal\u201d.<\/p>\n An excavator on a barge near the site of the port under construction for Samcheok Blue. The country has described the climate crisis as like \u2018nothing we\u2019ve experienced before\u2019. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Now a new generation of South Koreans is challenging the status quo through legal action. In February, a group of children gathered outside<\/a> Posco\u2019s office in Seoul. Among them was 11-year-old Yoohyun Kim, the youngest plaintiff in a groundbreaking lawsuit against Posco.<\/p>\n The case aims to block the company\u2019s plan to reline an old coal-fired blast furnace, a move that would extend its life by 15 years and emit an estimated 137m tonnes of CO2.<\/p>\n \u201cI came here during my precious winter break, my last as an elementary school student, because I want to protect all four seasons,\u201d Yoohyun told supporters. \u201cSpring and autumn are disappearing with climate change \u2013 and with them, the chance for children like me to play freely outside.\u201d<\/p>\n The lawsuit is the first of its kind globally to target traditional blast furnace production. It follows a crucial ruling by South Korea\u2019s constitutional court last August which found that the government\u2019s climate policies violated the rights of future generations<\/a> by failing to set legally binding targets for 2031-50.<\/p>\n In March, residents and activists filed another suit<\/a> over the government\u2019s approval of the world\u2019s largest semiconductor cluster in Yongin<\/a>, backed by<\/a> a 360tn won (\u00a3195bn) Samsung investment. The suit argues that the project\u2019s 10GW electricity demand and new LNG plants contradict climate regulations and corporate sustainability commitments.<\/p>\n A Kepco employee at work. The company is state-owned and has created structural problems for competitors. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/p>\n