South Korea energy profile
South Korea — almost no domestic fuel, the world's densest nuclear fleet
~97%
Electricity fuel imported (coal, oil, LNG)
~30%
Electricity from nuclear power
26-27
Operating reactors — highest density in the world
3rd
Largest nuclear operator globally, by capacity (KHNP)
Built for energy security, not just electricity
Why South Korea went all-in on nuclear power
The founding logic:
With essentially no domestic oil, gas, or coal of its own, South Korea began developing nuclear power in the 1970s explicitly to reduce vulnerability to global fossil-fuel shocks — commissioning its first reactor, Kori-1, in 1977-78. That logic has held for five decades: South Korea still imports roughly 97% of the fuel behind its electricity, has no cross-border gas pipelines, and depends entirely on LNG tankers, making it the world's third-largest LNG importer as of 2024. Reactors are concentrated at just four sites — Kori, Hanul, Hanbit, and Wolsong, near Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongju — giving South Korea the highest density of nuclear reactors per square mile of any country, since clustering multiple units per site is more efficient to build and maintain than spreading them out.
With essentially no domestic oil, gas, or coal of its own, South Korea began developing nuclear power in the 1970s explicitly to reduce vulnerability to global fossil-fuel shocks — commissioning its first reactor, Kori-1, in 1977-78. That logic has held for five decades: South Korea still imports roughly 97% of the fuel behind its electricity, has no cross-border gas pipelines, and depends entirely on LNG tankers, making it the world's third-largest LNG importer as of 2024. Reactors are concentrated at just four sites — Kori, Hanul, Hanbit, and Wolsong, near Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongju — giving South Korea the highest density of nuclear reactors per square mile of any country, since clustering multiple units per site is more efficient to build and maintain than spreading them out.
Policy whiplash:
Nuclear policy has swung sharply between South Korean administrations. President Moon Jae-in, elected in 2017 after Park Geun-hye's impeachment, pledged to phase out nuclear power following the Fukushima disaster and rising local earthquake concerns, halting new construction and declining to extend existing reactor lifespans. President Yoon Suk Yeol, elected in 2022, reversed course entirely — resuming construction, targeting a nuclear share of 32% by 2030 and 34.6-35% by 2036, and planning additional reactors and small modular reactors through 2038. The reversal also reflects nuclear's much lower generation cost compared with solar and wind in Korea's specific market, and concerns about the financial health of state utility KEPCO.
Nuclear policy has swung sharply between South Korean administrations. President Moon Jae-in, elected in 2017 after Park Geun-hye's impeachment, pledged to phase out nuclear power following the Fukushima disaster and rising local earthquake concerns, halting new construction and declining to extend existing reactor lifespans. President Yoon Suk Yeol, elected in 2022, reversed course entirely — resuming construction, targeting a nuclear share of 32% by 2030 and 34.6-35% by 2036, and planning additional reactors and small modular reactors through 2038. The reversal also reflects nuclear's much lower generation cost compared with solar and wind in Korea's specific market, and concerns about the financial health of state utility KEPCO.
From importer to exporter
Korea's APR1400 — and the Ulsan refining complex
Exporting whole nuclear plants:
South Korea developed its own reactor design lineage — OPR-1000, then the APR1400, certified by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2019, one of the few non-US reactor designs to achieve that. KEPCO and its nuclear subsidiary KHNP built all four APR1400 units at Barakah in the UAE, completed September 2024, the Arab world's first nuclear plant, now supplying up to a quarter of UAE electricity. Building on that track record, KHNP won a roughly $18.6 billion contract in July 2024 for two new units at Dukovany, Czech Republic, and has ongoing projects in Egypt (El Dabaa) and Romania (Cernavodă) — making South Korea one of a small handful of countries capable of exporting complete nuclear power plants rather than just components.
South Korea developed its own reactor design lineage — OPR-1000, then the APR1400, certified by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2019, one of the few non-US reactor designs to achieve that. KEPCO and its nuclear subsidiary KHNP built all four APR1400 units at Barakah in the UAE, completed September 2024, the Arab world's first nuclear plant, now supplying up to a quarter of UAE electricity. Building on that track record, KHNP won a roughly $18.6 billion contract in July 2024 for two new units at Dukovany, Czech Republic, and has ongoing projects in Egypt (El Dabaa) and Romania (Cernavodă) — making South Korea one of a small handful of countries capable of exporting complete nuclear power plants rather than just components.
Ulsan — refining at industrial scale:
Ulsan, one of the four nuclear-adjacent cities, is also home to one of the world's largest oil refining complexes — SK Energy and S-Oil operate a combined roughly 840,000 bbl/day of capacity there, built around what has effectively become an entire industrial city dedicated to petrochemicals and heavy manufacturing. The concentration of nuclear power, refining, and heavy industry around Ulsan and Busan reflects a broader pattern in South Korea's energy planning: cluster energy-intensive infrastructure near the industrial demand centres that consume it.
Ulsan, one of the four nuclear-adjacent cities, is also home to one of the world's largest oil refining complexes — SK Energy and S-Oil operate a combined roughly 840,000 bbl/day of capacity there, built around what has effectively become an entire industrial city dedicated to petrochemicals and heavy manufacturing. The concentration of nuclear power, refining, and heavy industry around Ulsan and Busan reflects a broader pattern in South Korea's energy planning: cluster energy-intensive infrastructure near the industrial demand centres that consume it.
Questions
Questions about South Korean energy
How did South Korea go from having almost no nuclear expertise to exporting entire nuclear plants abroad?
It took roughly five decades of consistent, government-backed investment in a single national goal: energy independence. South Korea's nuclear programme began in the 1970s importing foreign reactor designs — its early plants used Westinghouse and Framatome (French) technology under license. Rather than staying a permanent customer, Korea systematically built domestic engineering capability across every part of the supply chain — reactor design, construction management, fuel fabrication, and safety systems — culminating in the Optimized Power Reactor (OPR-1000) developed locally in the 1990s-2000s, and then the APR1400, a more advanced design good enough to pass US Nuclear Regulatory Commission certification in 2019, a genuinely difficult bar that few non-US designs have cleared. By the time Korea won the Barakah contract in the UAE in 2009, it wasn't licensing someone else's technology — it was selling a complete, homegrown design, backed by a track record of building reactors on schedule and on budget at home, which is far from guaranteed in the nuclear industry globally. That combination — proven domestic execution plus an internationally certified design — is what let Korea compete for, and win, contracts against far more established nuclear exporters like France's EDF and Russia's Rosatom. Source: World Nuclear Association · Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power (KHNP) · Stanford University nuclear energy program.
Provenance
Attribution and citation
- Sources
- World Nuclear Association · US EIA · Wikipedia (Energy in South Korea; Nuclear power in South Korea; Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power) · Stanford University energy program · Grokipedia
- Cite as
- "South Korea Energy Profile — Complete Reference", The Energy Codex, https://thecodex.expert/energy/countries/south-korea/, last updated .