«Problems of economics and management of oil and gas complex»

Nuclear power and gas competition in the energy balance of Japan and South Korea: Impact on the LNG market

UDC: 338.012
DOI: 10.33285/1999-6942-2023-6(222)-47-58

Authors:

¹ E.M. Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia

Keywords: Japan, Republic of Korea, fuel and energy complex, fuel and energy balance, LNG, nuclear power

Annotation:

Japan and the Republic of Korea are among the most economically developed countries in Northeast Asia and one of the largest consumers and importers of fuel and energy resources in the Asia-Pacific region. Taking into account the minimal reserves and production volumes of their own hydrocarbon fuel and energy resources, trends in demand for imported energy carriers in these countries, in particular LNG, have a significant impact on global energy markets. In addition, nuclear energy has historically been of high importance in the fuel and energy complex of Japan and the Republic of Korea, the development of which began in the late 1960s. After the disaster at the "Fukushima-1" nuclear power plant in 2011, there was a long-term pause in the development of nuclear energy in Japan. However, in 2018–2022, both Japan and the Republic of Korea developed and adopted the updated versions of national documents of state strategic planning in the fuel and energy complex, which assume long-term operation of existing nuclear power plants while reducing the consumption of hydrocarbon fuels in favor of increasing the share of renewable energy sources (RES) in the energy balance. Thus, further intensive growth of LNG consumption in these countries seems unlikely, and the key uncertainty factor is the non-obvious prospects for replacing fuel generation by renewable energy sources and hydrogen energy.

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