Is Korea serious about fighting climate change?

By Robert D. Atkinson

At various global summits and venues, leaders of many nations, including Korea, have firmly stated their pledges to take all needed action to cut global emissions leading to climate change. Like many developed nations, Korea has committed to achieving carbon neutrality, in its case, by 2050. The Yoon Suk Yeol administration also recently tightened reduction targets and aims to use less carbon-intensive energy sources to reduce emissions by 45.9 percent from 2018 levels by 2030.

This sounds good, but setting targets is not the same as meeting them. When it comes to the most important step Korea can take to address global climate change ― boosting clean energy R&D ― Korea, like most developed nations, is lagging. Without much better and cheaper clean energy technologies the world will not get to net zero for the simple reason that voters will tell their leaders they are not willing to pay more. This is especially true in the fastest-growing developing economies where paying more for energy is not popular.

After the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation proposed that nations commit to doubling their clean energy research, development and demonstration (RD&D) spending to address climate change, 23 countries plus the European Union, including Korea, launched Mission Innovation (MI 1.0) in 2015 to "accelerate the pace of clean energy innovation."

One of MI 1.0's main goals was to double governmental investment in clean energy R&D by 2020. As 2020 came and went, only one of those members, the United Kingdom, met that goal. In contrast, Korea's investment in clean energy R&D increased by just 10 percent, less than the United States' increase of 32 percent, but at least ahead of 8 other nations. As a share of GDP, Korea's clean energy R&D investment actually fell over this period.

In 2021, after Korea and most other Mission Innovation countries failed to meet their stated goal of doubling clean energy R&D, they promised once again increases, launching MI 2.0 to "mobilize and connect global R&D efforts." However, MI 2.0 backed off from MI 1.0's goals and did not specify doubling R&D investments. It only recognized the International Energy Agency's (IEA's) assessment that "at least $90 billion of public funding is needed by 2026 to demonstrate the technologies necessary to decarbonize global energy systems by 2050." Two years into MI 2.0, most MI member countries are still woefully under-investing in clean energy R&D, investing just $35 billion a year, $55 billion short of the IEA's $90 billion goal.

Even though the United States has been criticized for not doing more to address climate change, it has managed to double, by 2022, the original goal set in the first phase of MI (MI 1.0) thanks to the passage of recent bills providing significant clean energy funding.

But Korea is far from the original 2015 doubling goal, increasing by only around 30 percent. However, more recent progress has been a bit more hopeful. South Korea's public RD&D in 2022 is 18 percent higher than 2020's. The uptake is driven mostly by increases in R&D for carbon capture and hydrogen and fuel cell technologies and net zero industries such as steel, cement, chemicals and refining.

Why is more R&D the key to solving climate change? The answer is simple: the world lacks the technology needed to reach net zero, and certainly not at a cost on par with fossil fuels. While some technologies, such as solar and wind, have gotten cheaper, in most nations they are still subsidized and there is no current path to get to a 100 percent renewable grid because of the high costs of energy storage needed to deal with the intermittency of the sun shining and the wind blowing. In short, as depressing as it might be to climate activists who demand change now, continued investment in technology innovation is crucial to achieving a low-carbon future.

But won't Koreans and others around the world be willing to wear a "hair shirt" and pay more for clean energy to do their part to save the planet? Not likely. In 2016, the average Korean was willing to pay just 4,232 won more a month for clean energy. Global warming is global, and as such requires global solutions that work in all nations, especially low-income countries where emissions continue to grow rapidly with an expanding population, economic growth, urbanization and electrification. So effective solutions can only be those that all consumers, corporations and nations can adopt with little or no extra cost or reduced performance. The current strategy in Korea and elsewhere of forcing more expensive and often less functional clean energy solutions onto users cannot, therefore, scale globally and is not even likely to scale in wealthy countries that are most fervently committed to addressing climate change. We need innovation, not more force and fearmongering.

So far, Mission Innovation seems mostly talk and little action. In the face of a climate disaster that has already begun, the world's nations must mobilize. There is indeed no time to waste, and we should already be much farther along than we are. Clean energy is now a necessity, not an aspiration. Getting affordable and effective clean energy requires first and foremost significantly more innovation, and that is largely dependent on government R&D funding. So rather than spend money subsidizing current industries or giving green handouts to developing nations, the most impactful step Korea can take is to boost its clean energy R&D funding. Not only will it help the planet, but it will help Korea win in clean energy global competitiveness.

Robert D. Atkinson (@RobAtkinsonITIF) is the president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), an independent, nonpartisan research and educational institute focusing on the intersection of technological innovation and public policy. The views expressed in the above article are those of the author and do not reflect the editorial direction of The Korea Times.