Nuclear Energy in South Korea, Part I: Nuclear Energy in the Context of Energy Security

By Andrew Ju

This post is the first of a series that will examine civilian nuclear energy in South Korea. This initial post will trace the history of nuclear energy in South Korea and how its growth aligns itself with energy security concerns.

A defining strategic problem of South Korea in the modern era is its energy insecurity, or the question of how to obtain the energy resources it requires. While energy security is an issue that all countries must factor for in national strategies, it is a particularly acute and dominant issue in Korea’s strategic thinking for several reasons. The most basic reason is that South Korea is effectively devoid of any energy resources. Of its total energy supply, Korea imports 84% from abroad, one of the highest levels in the world. (In comparison, Japan imports 82%, Germany 60%, and the US only 27%). This scarcity is only exacerbated by Korea’s extensive steel, shipbuilding, and petrochemical industries that form one of the world’s most energy-intensive industrial economies in the world. The third complication is that Korea is unusually dependent on oil as a fuel source, particularly from the Middle East. These three problems together are known commonly as Korea’s triple energy-security dilemma. The severity of Korea’s triple dilemma alone is difficult to manage but the context in which Korea must operate is also a feature of the problem that is often overlooked. Korea is located in the most energy competitive region of the world, with 4 of the top 10 global energy consumers and 4 of the top 7 global consumers of oil located in Asia. There is in fact a paucity of energy resources not just in Korea but in the general region. Not a single major expanding onshore oil field exists in the immense space between Sakhalin and Indonesia. Japan, Taiwan, and coastal mainland China – collectively holding a population close to 1 billion – all lack significant oil and gas reserves as well. Asia’s booming economic activity despite its regional lack of energy sources create an intensely competitive arena, with many nations seeking large and increasing amounts of imported energy, especially oil, often from the same sea lanes and pipelines. While energy markets are global and resources should therefore be theoretically equally transferable from one place to another, the realities are more complex. “Pipeline politics”, development of foreign relations with oil-rich countries, and strategic investments abroad are all tools in play to secure a steady flow of energy.

Korea has responded to these insecurities by developing nuclear energy as a domestic base load energy source. While nuclear energy has important political and safety downsides, Korea’s mastery of the technology has allowed it to significantly offset the imports of foreign energy resources in exchange for the comparably miniscule cost of uranium. For example, while some $170 billion was spent to import fuel in 2011, this figure would have been $20 billion higher if not for domestic nuclear power. South Korea’s nuclear activities began only a few years after the Korean War ended, with Korea becoming a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency in 1957. It passed its first dedicated legislation, the Atomic Energy Act, in 1958, and established the Office of Atomic Energy in 1959. Despite technical support from the United States, Korea’s nuclear activities stayed strictly in the realm of academic research until the 1970s. The oil shocks of the 1973 and 1979, however, rocked Korea along with the rest of the world and revealed the importance of energy security (the very idea of energy security as a national priority was in fact created in response to these oil shocks). A flurry of support and interest in commercial nuclear power followed the oil shocks with Korea’s first commercial reactor becoming operational in 1978. (It should be noted that this interest in nuclear energy after the oil shocks was not unique to Korea – much of the world responded similarly). Korea has not looked back since in its quest to develop nuclear energy. Today, Korea is one of the most nuclear-dependent countries in the world, with its usage of nuclear energy double the global average. While political fluctuations make it difficult to pinpoint exactly how much Korea will depend on nuclear in the future, there is little doubt that nuclear will at least remain a mainstay in Korea’s energy arsenal, if not expand.

References

Calder, Kent. Korea’s Energy Insecurities: Comparative and Regional Insecurities. Washington DC: Korea Economic Institute , 2005.

Future of Nuclear Energy in Emerging Markets: South Korea. Forum on Energy. 2014. http://forumonenergy.com/2014/01/31/future-of-nuclear-energy-in-emerging-markets-south-korea/ (accessed February 7, 2014).

WNA, . World Nuclear Association , “Nuclear Power in South Korea.” Last modified January 30, 2014. Accessed February 7, 2014. http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-O-S/South-Korea/.