No Grid to Connect Even After Plant Construction... Comprehensive Grid Overhaul

40% of Demand Concentrated in Seoul Metro Area, While Renewables Cluster in Non-Metropolitan Regions

Maximizing Existing Grids with Flexible Connections and ESS; Reallocating Delayed Project Rights

Abolishing First-Come, First-Served Access; Competitive Bidding to Prioritize Projects Ready for Implementation

The government has announced plans to expand renewable energy facilities to over 100GW by 2030. However, the power grid required to transport the electricity generated is lagging behind these ambitions. Some areas, despite having sites and companies ready to build power plants, cannot proceed because there is no available connection point to the power grid. This is why the government has decided to implement a comprehensive overhaul of power grid access and operation, moving beyond simply building more transmission lines.

Grid Bottlenecks Blocking Renewable Energy

According to the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment on September 29, one of the biggest issues with Korea’s power grid is the geographical separation between electricity production and consumption. While only 12% of the country’s land area—the Seoul metropolitan area—accounts for roughly 40% of total power demand, new power generation facilities such as solar and wind will continue to be concentrated in non-metropolitan regions. In the Honam region alone, approved renewable energy generation capacity is expected to rise from a cumulative 13GW last year to 58.6GW by 2036.

The pace of grid construction cannot keep up with this growth. It typically takes 1–2 years to build new distribution lines, 6 years for a 154kV substation, and more than 9 years for a 345kV transmission line. In Honam, both transmission and distribution networks are saturated, meaning that under the current system, some new renewable energy projects in the region would not be able to connect to the grid until after 2034.

There are also numerous cases where even secured grid capacity is not being utilized effectively. This occurs when companies secure connection rights in the early phases of project development on a first-come, first-served basis, but permitting or business delays prevent projects from proceeding for an extended period, blocking access for subsequent projects. This is known as ‘grid hoarding.’ For example, offshore wind projects in the Honam region secured 15.8GW of connection rights by 2030, but only about 3GW is expected to actually be connected.

Maximizing Current Grids Rather Than Waiting for New Ones

The government’s solution is to maximize the use of existing grid capacity instead of waiting for new infrastructure to be built. The traditional method, which assessed connection eligibility based on the assumption that solar installations would always generate at maximum annual output, will be revised. The new approach, known as ‘flexible connections,’ will allow power plants to be connected under normal circumstances, with output only curtailed temporarily when generation exceeds grid capacity.

With this revision, solar connection capacity on distribution lines will increase from 14MW to 16MW, and at substations from 50MW to 60MW. In the Honam region alone, this will enable an additional 2.6GW of solar energy to be accepted without constructing new power lines.

Any residual bottlenecks will be addressed using energy storage systems (ESS). Solar energy generated during peak hours in the day will be stored, and then released into the network at night when grid capacity is available. By 2030, the government aims to use ESS in distribution networks to allow another 3GW of solar to be connected, and to install ESS at saturated substations to secure about 1.6GW of additional grid space. ESS will also be deployed as an emergency backup in transmission networks, allowing transmission capacity that was previously kept vacant for emergencies to be used for actual power transport. This approach, called a ‘non-wires alternative (NWA)’, increases grid utilization without building new transmission lines or substations.

Clearing Out ‘Grid Hoarding’ and Revising Connection Standards

Established connection rights held by projects will also be reviewed. Through inspections for dormant or inactive projects, the government has reclaimed about 9GW of connection rights so far. Going forward, in cases where projects are delayed significantly—even if not canceled outright—the connection timing will be postponed. For the Honam region, the government estimates that among the 15.8GW in offshore wind connection rights secured for 2030, around 10GW can have their timelines rescheduled. The grid capacity freed up through this process will be redistributed to subsequent solar and other renewable projects that can actually move forward.

The criteria for determining whether renewables can be connected to the grid will also be revised to better reflect real-world conditions. Until now, grid assessments assumed that existing coal and liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants would supply power before newly added renewables. In reality, renewables typically have priority over fossil fuel sources, but the calculations reversed this hierarchy. Moving forward, grid access calculations will rank renewables ahead of ordinary coal and LNG plants, mirroring actual operations. The government anticipates that this rule change alone will create additional capacity for about 18GW of renewables in Yeongnam and Gangwon, and approximately 20GW across non-metropolitan regions.

The method for allocating connection rights is also changing. Previously, grid access was secured by developers who applied first in the early stages of project planning. Now, in line with reforms to the Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS), all projects will be evaluated for economic feasibility, public benefit, and grid constraints. Starting in January 2027, projects that win competitive bids will receive both fixed price contracts and grid connection rights. In short, grid access will be given not to ‘first applicants,’ but to ‘projects that are actually ready for implementation.’

According to Minister Kim Seonghwan of the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment, “This initiative is not about waiting for new grids to be built, but about using our current grids as efficiently as possible. Within a year of our ministry’s launch, we have lifted the renewable connection constraints that had been in place since September 2024, and have now reopened new renewable grid connections in Honam.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.