Even if South Korea’s government, under President Moon Jae-In, has carved two pathways to take in reaching its carbon neutrality targets, analysts still expect the country’s renewable energy growth to remain slow. The culprit? The country’s lack of space for renewables deployment, high cost, and maybe even the presidential election.

The Presidential Committee on Carbon Neutrality had unveiled two new roadmaps to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 with both frameworks calling for the abolition of coal-fired power generation. The roadmaps, however, differed over their direction in terms of liquefied natural gas (LNG) with one seeking to eliminate it, whilst the other opting to retain LNG with carbon capture technologies.

Despite phase-out plans for coal, Rystad Energy sees South Korea’s coal capacity increasing in the short term as additional coal power units are currently under construction; whilst natural gas, which has a much lower carbon footprint, is projected to become its largest power source by the late 2020s.

Guest post from Asian Power