South Korea to Build 12 New Nuclear Plants

South Korea has announced an important new investment in energy production, including plans to build 12 new nuclear plants and 19 new fossil fuel thermoelectric plants.

It plans to spend 37 trillion won (28.5 billion dollars) from 2009 through 2022 in constructing 12 commercial reactors and 19 thermoelectric power plants, the ministry of knowledge economy said in a statement.

The ministry said 12 new nuclear power plants -- including eight under construction -- will be completed by 2012.

Eleven of the thermoelectric power plants to be built by 2022 would be fuelled by liquefied natural gas, seven by coal and one by fuel oil, it said.

South Korea, which relies heavily on oil imports, has tried to reduce its dependence on crude, diversify energy sources and cut down on the emission of greenhouse gases amid increasing power demand at home.

The country now has 20 commercial nuclear reactors and 85 thermoelectric power plants fuelled by either coal, gas or oil.

Nuclear power plants meet 34 percent of the country's total electricity demand this year, and they will cover 48 percent by 2022, the ministry said. _Energy-Daily

Every nation that considers its future seriously, will need to commit to nuclear power, and coal -- particularly if it has coal deposits under its own territory. Idiots and fools will gamble on wind energy. The unserious will gamble on large scale solar without utility scale storage. But the sane and the serious will be forced to commit to nuclear and coal -- preferably coal by gasification.

In the long run, large-scale solar (with storage), enhanced geothermal, advanced bio-energy, and nuclear fusion, will all carry humans cleanly and energetically for as long as the race survives. For the short and intermediate terms, fossil fuels and nuclear fission will be the workhorses of intelligent societies that wish to survive past the fossil fuel age.

Carbon hysterics such as Al Gore, the IPCC, the EU climate bureaucracies, and the idiots making up much of Obama's incoming administration, have no clue about either the climate, or the energy needs of thriving, healthy societies. Best to bypass them at every opportunity.