• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.31 no.1D
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• pp.111-117
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• 2011

In the wake of increased concerns on reduction of greenhouse emission which started with United Nation's Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and Kyoto protocol, Korean government is making various efforts under the represented slogan "Low Carbon, Green Growth". Therefore, it is inevitable that construction industry also follow the Korea government's slogan and the international trend in environmental problems. This study identified several main construction materials and equipments of civil construction projects and suggested a environmental cost estimation method and related estimation standards (Public and private owners are distinguished). A case analysis of a real road construction project is also performed and characteristics according to the owner type is compared. This study analyzed the environmental impact to total construction cost variations. In the result, public owner required 11~16% of extra budget and private owner required 19~22% of extra costs. This study is limited in consideration of environmental factors and carbon trading prices.

• Journal of the Korean Association of Geographic Information Studies
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.222-237
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• 2022

This study was performed to predict change of forestland area in future to 2050 based on System Dynamics Model which is based on feedback loop by causal relationship. As forestland area change in the future depends on potential forestland conversion demands, each demand type of forestland conversion such as agricultural, industrial, public and residential/commercial use was modeled using annual GDP, population, number of household, household construction permission area (1981~2019). In results, all of conversion demands would have continuously decreased to 2050 while residential and commercial land would be reduced from 2034. Due to such shortage, eventually, total of forestland in South Korea would have decreased to 6.18 million ha when compared to current 6.29 million ha. Moreover, the forestland conversion to other use types must be occurred continuously in future because most of forestland is owned privately in South Korea. Such steady decrement of forestland area in future can contribute to the shortage of carbon sink and encumber achievement of national carbon-neutral goal to 2050. If forestland conversion would be occurred inevitably in future according to such change trends of all types, improved laws and polices related to forestland should be prepared for planned use and rational conservation in terms of whole territory management. Therefore, it is needed to offer sufficient incentive, such as tax reduction and payment of ecosystem service on excellent forestland protection and maintenance, to private owners for minimizing forestland conversion. Moreover, active afforestation policy and practice have to be implemented on idle land for reaching national goal 'Carbon Neutral to 2050' in South Korea.

• Journal of Environmental Policy
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.97-122
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• 2012

This article analyzes the effects of energy price increase induced by GHGs mitigation policy on automobile industry empirically. An increase in energy price due to GHGs mitigation policy does not have a significant effect on the production and the value-added in automobile industry. Electricity price has a negative effect on the production and the value-added in automobile industry, but it is not significant. However, employment is significantly affected by a change in electricity price. Export is also affected negatively, but the effect is insignificant. These results imply that GHGs mitigation policy such as carbon tax might affect adversely the employment in automobile industry. Especially, their effects on employment are significant. Therefore, some moderating measures to relieve the adverse effects on employment in automobile industry should be called upon with the implementation of GHGs mitigation policy.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.112-122
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• 2009

Payment of Forest Landscape Service (PFLS) is based on the value of landscape conservation and is a positive forest policy inducing the owners of mountains to improve environmental service quality with economic incentives. The purpose of this study is to test the feasibility of PFLS and find out the elements related to PFLS such as associated statutes, target applications, eligible owner's requirements, and applicable environmental services. Research sites were selected in designated reserved forests by law and surveys were carried out with 28 professional forestry engineers and 10 owners of reserved forests located in Chungnam Province in November, 2008. As a result, the owners are willing to participate pilot-project of PFLS if they could have tax incentives. Preferred activities in their forestry are eco-tourism and carbon emission trading as PFLS business model. Although they expect low economic benefit from the PFLS, respondents answered introducing PFLS will give good opportunities for owners of a reserved forest to enhance willingness to manage their forestry properly for the landscape conservation. In this study, PFLS evaluation indicators and policy directions are established and recommends the strategies to cope with changing needs of forestry conservation by inducing the owners' active participation in the sustainable forest landscape management.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.509-546
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• 2010

Although coal has been utilized as major fuel, it is known as 'most climate unfriendly' fuel. Carbon tax or tradable permit policy has been discussed as major measure for reducing production and consumption of coal, but it might be more efficient to remove subsidy on coal production and consumption. This study examines economic and environmental effects of recycling revenue from reducing subsidy on the use of coal to foster climate friendly fuel (ligneous biomass) by price subsidy or increased public expenditure. A static CGE model was applied to analyze the welfare consequences and economic impacts of two policy measures. The result shows that price subsidy policy is more desirable than creation of public demand in terms of welfare as well as overall economic impacts.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.261-290
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• 2022

Although market stabilization measures have been triggered in the K-ETS, carbon price is still under uncertainty. Considering Korea's 2030 enhanced reduction target announced in October 2021, it is crucial to have practical stabilization measures to appropriately deal with price uncertainty. This study examines the quantitative effects of a price collar, which is considered as a means of alleviating price uncertainty, on expected cumulative emissions and abatement costs. There are three main scenarios: carbon tax, emissions trading system, and emissions trading system with a price collar. Monte Carlo simulation was conducted to reflect uncertainty in emission. There are several results as follows: 1) In a price collar, domestic emission target is likely to be achieved with a lower expected abatement cost than other scenarios. In addition, there is a small amount of excess emissions in this research and it would be not critical(0.1% excess than target); 2) Prohibiting banking increases the expected abatement cost. This is because firms can not intertemporally reallocate allowances to match the firm's optimal emissions path; 3) With the adoption of a price collar, government's net revenue can be positive even if the government's purchase volume of emissions allowances is more than sales volume. This is because the government sells them at price ceiling and purchases them at price floor.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.275-311
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• 2007

Hydrogen energy is emphasized as a substitutable energy of carbon-based energy system in the future, since it is non-depletable and clean energy. Long term vision of Korean government on the national energy system is to promote hydrogen energy by 15% of final energy demand until 2040. This study analyzes economic impacts of hydrogen energy development employing a dynamic CGE model for Korea. Frontier technology such as hydrogen energy is featured as slow diffusion at the initial stage due to the learning effect and energy complementarity. Without government intervention, hydrogen energy would be produced upto 6.5% of final energy demand until 2040. However, if government subsidizes sales price of hydrogen energy by 10%, 20%, and 30%, share of hydrogen energy would increase 9.2%, 15.2%, and 37.7% of final energy demand. This result shows that the slow diffusion problem of hydrogen energy as frontier technology could be figured out by market incentive policy. On the other hand, production levels of transportation sector would increase while growth rate of oil and electricity sectors would decline. Household consumption would be affected negatively since increase of consumption due to the price decrease would be overwhelmed by income reduction owing to the increase of tax. Overall, GDP would not decrease or increase significantly since total production, investment, and export would increase even if household consumption declines.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.27-60
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• 2016

An integrated assessment model of climate and the economy (IAM) has been a standard tool for the economic analysis of climate change and policy recommendations. Since policy measures to address climate change take places at a national level, a regional integrated assessment model of climate and the economy (RIAM) is gaining more importance. A RIAM is a useful tool for the assessment of regional (or national) impacts of climate change. This paper investigates the main features of the currently available RIAMs. The focus is social welfare functions and the regional aspects of climate change. The comparative analysis shows that there is a huge gap between the economics of climate change and its applications to RIAMs. As an application, this paper examines the effect of social welfare functions on optimal solutions of the RICE (Regional Integrated model of Climate and the Economy) model. It is found that optimal climate policy such as carbon tax or emissions control rate is very sensitive to the assumptions on social welfare functions of RIAMs. It is better for each country to have their own RIAM as a basic tool for national climate policy-making and for international bargaining in greenhouse-gas mitigation. This is because a country's own preferences such as efficiency, equity, and sustainable development as well as national circumstances can be reflected in RIAM. The Republic of Korea has not developed its own RIAM yet. The comparative analysis and the numerical model in this paper can be a stepping stone for the development of such a national model.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.399-420
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• 2018

This study has attempted environmental economic analysis on the cost structure of offshore fisheries based on fishery management data published by the Fisheries Research Institute to examine the effect of the environmental policy on the fisheries for the effective implementation of the Paris Convention. Under the assumption that both fisheries and carbon dioxide are simultaneously produced, the cost structure of offshore fisheries were analyzed. Cost function in a translog form was estimated and SUR (Seemingly Unrelated Regression) model was used for the analysis. Here, $CO_2$ emission of offshore fishery was calculated by using National Federation of Fisheries Cooperatives' data on supply of tax exemption oil (2003~2016). The cost function estimation showed that there is a weak disposition between catches and $CO_2$ emissions during the sample period, and the marginal abatement cost (MAC) is estimated at 1,457 won per year. In addition, for the same period, when 1% of $CO_2$ per horsepower is to be reduced MAC increases by 2.2%, and when 1% of $CO_2$ per 1 ton of catch is to be reduced, MAC increases by 1.4%.

• Journal of Climate Change Research
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.181-195
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• 2018

On December 12, 2015, the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) adopted the Paris Agreement, in which several developed and developing countries all committed to participating in the reduction of greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions. South Korea has submitted an intended nationally determined contribution (INDC) proposal with a target to cut down 37% greenhouse gas business as usual (BAU) until 2030 in preparation for the 2030 GHG BAU. Under the post-2020 regime, which will be launched from 2021 as the agreement entered into force early, it is expected that efforts to support GHG reduction and adaptation to climate change in developing countries will be accelerated with the utilization of technologies and financial resources of developed countries. South Korea has established the Basic Plan for Climate Change Response and the Basic National Roadmap for Greenhouse Gas Reductions by 2030 to promote the response to climate change at the government level. The Ministry of Science and ICT, as the National Designated Entity designated by the UNFCCC, has come up with middle and long-term strategies for climate technology cooperation. South-Korea has an abundance of energy-consuming industries to support its export-oriented industrial structure; it is thus expected that achieving the GHG reduction target will incur a considerable cost. Moreover, in order to meet the reduction target (11.3%) of the intended nationally determined contribution proposed by South Korea, it is necessary for South Korea to actively promote projects that can achieve GHG reduction achievements, and financial resources are needed as leverage to reduce risks that can occur in the early stages of projects and attract private sector investment. This paper summarizes the theoretical discussions on climate finance and conducted a comparative analysis on the status of the funds related to climate change response in the UK, Germany, Japan and Denmark. Through this, we proposed the legal and policy tasks that should be carried forward to raise public funds that can be used for creation of new industries related to climate change as well as to reduce GHG emissions in South Korea. The Climate Change Countermeasures Act, which has been proposed by the National Assembly of South-Korea, stipulates the establishment of funds but there is no additional funding except for general account. In this regard, it is also possible to take measures such as the introduction of carbon tax or the collection and use of royalties through technology research and development projects for climate change, such as Industrial Technology Innovation Promotion Act. In addition, since funds are used in various fields such as domestic greenhouse gas reduction, technology development, and overseas projects, it is necessary to establish a system in which various ministries cooperate with the operation of the fund.