Organisers of the World Future Energy Summit have confirmed South Korea’s future energy blueprint will be presented by Kim Young Hak, Vice Minister for Trade and Energy, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy, on the first day of the event in Abu Dhabi.
The South Korean Minister has confirmed his participation in the upcoming Summit, and will be a keynote speaker in the Energy Ministers’ panel on January 18th.
Yong-Chil Chung, Ambassador of the Republic of Korea said: “Korea is emerging as a leader of green growth. We are very happy to participate in the World Future Energy Summit and hope that this event will open the door to substantial green initiatives and projects.â€
The World Future Energy Summit, now in its third year, is witnessing unprecedented Korean participation with many of Korea’s leading companies including DAE Shin Demister, Jusung Engineering Co. Ltd, Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction, Hyundai-Kai Company, Korea Institute of Energy, Technology Evaluation and Planning (KETEP), and Posco Power among others.
The South Korean government is committed to securing new sources of energy, and recently announced that they will be spending 50 trillion won ($38 billion) over the next four years in a “Green New Deal”. The project which is endorsed by the Ministry of Strategy and Finance includes recycling, carbon reduction, energy conservation, flood prevention, river management and maintaining forest resources. [1] This ambitious initiative is intended to spur economic growth and create more than 956,000 jobs.
South Korea is also planning to increase the proportion of power generation sourced from renewable energy from 1.0 percent presently to 1.7 percent by 2011. This target will be achieved through a five-fold increase in green energy investments by the country’s nine state-owned energy companies.[2]
The World Future Energy Summit Energy Ministers’ panel discussion will be attended by Ministers coming from developing and developed countries, to discuss the challenge of balancing energy demand and sustaining economic development versus meeting environmental realities.
