EPURON completes first photovoltaic project in South Korea
- 2 MW-project valued at 10 Mio Euro
- South Korea’s pv market is rapidly growing due to feed-in tariffs
Hamburg, May 29, 2008: The Korean subsidiary of EPURON GmbH has completed its first photovoltaic project with an output of 2 megawatt. The plant is valued at 10 Mio Euro. EPURON Korea was commissioned by Samchully Co. Ltd, a leading Korean energy firm, to finance and develop the plant. Parent company Conergy was contracted to execute the engineering and construction as well as the operational management of the plant. The plant has just received approval for commissioning andis now fully operational.
The solar plant is located on the grounds of the 2008 Hampyeong World Butterfly and Insect Expo, held annually in Hampyeong County in South Korea. The Expo is a major event for tourism, culture and economy for Korea’s southern region, and draws up to 2 million visitors annually. The solar plant, which is raised on steel beam structures above the parking lot, occupies about 47,000 m2 of the exhibition grounds and has an output of 2.4 GWh per year. Up to 1,500 tonnes in CO2 savings will be realized – which also equates to the energy needs of approximately 550 households.
Young Bok Lee, CEO and President of Samchully said “The Conergy Group’s unparalleled strengths in project development and engineering expertise have proven extremely beneficial to this venture. We are proud to work with a reliable and market-leading partner who believes strongly in the cause for environmental sustainability in Korea.As the key event for promoting eco-awareness in Korea, the World Butterfly and Insect Expo is an excellent opportunity for us to contribute to this cause while showcasing the benefits of renewable energy sources.”
EPURON has reached a major milestone in South Korea with the completion of its first large scale project. "The project for Samchully stabilizes the market position of the Conergy Group in South Korea,” said Joachim Müller, CFO at EPURON. "Substantial growth in renewable energy has recently begun to pick up in South Korea, as proven by the rapid increase in project realization and interest from investors.”
South Korea's energy consumption increases about 7 percent every year. The rapid energy demand has forced the country to import energy. To relieve the high dependence on foreign energy producers, the government of the tiger economy in Seoul has launched a market incentive scheme to develop renewable energies in 2004. Similar toGermany, the construction of solar energy systems is subsidized with low-interest loans and each kilowatt hour of solar energy fed into the public grid is rewarded with the equivalent of 40 Euro cent, guaranteed for 15 years. From 2010, the duration of the scheme will be extended to 20 years with up to 33 Euro cents being paid per kilowatt hour.