Minister of Climate, Environment and Energy Kim Sung-hwan attends a meeting July 16 at the Jeonnam-Gwangju integrated special city hall to discuss power supply plans for the Honam semiconductor industrial complex. [Yonhap]
Minister of Climate, Environment and Energy Kim Sung-hwan attends a meeting July 16 at the Jeonnam-Gwangju integrated special city hall to discuss power supply plans for the Honam semiconductor industrial complex. [Yonhap]

Minister of Climate, Environment and Energy Kim Sung-hwan said Wednesday, "I will do everything in my power to provide policy support so that leading models of carbon neutrality and the circular economy can spread across the entire industry and enhance the global green competitiveness of our companies."

Kim made the remarks during visits Wednesday to Samsung C&T's Residential Performance Research Institute and Samsung Electronics' Suwon campus in Gyeonggi Province, as well as the Greater Seoul Resource Circulation Center, a recycler of waste electrical and electronic equipment. He said the conversion of industrial and building thermal energy to heat pumps, reducing everyday plastic use and recovering critical minerals from waste electronics are "the core pillars of promoting carbon neutrality and the circular economy."

The visits were arranged to inspect sites related to thermal energy decarbonization and the spread of the circular economy, and to explore policy directions for decarbonizing building heating and cooling, reducing plastic use and maximizing resource recovery and recycling.

At Samsung C&T's Residential Performance Research Institute, Kim inspected a demonstration site for an integrated heating-and-cooling heat pump system, examining how the equipment operates, its energy efficiency and the conditions for real-world application.

The integrated heat pump is a high-efficiency electrification system that uses outdoor air to supply cooling, heating and hot water through a single unit, reducing the fossil fuel consumption of buildings.

The Ministry of Climate, Environment and Energy plans to review the installation and electrical infrastructure conditions and regulatory obstacles identified at the demonstration site, and to gradually build a policy framework for expanding heat pump deployment in apartment complexes.

Kim also visited Samsung Electronics' Suwon campus to commend its leading use of reusable containers on-site, and to explore ways to promote the transition to reusable containers at multi-use facilities by reviewing the supply, use and collection process.

All 22 cafes and cafeterias at the Samsung Electronics Suwon campus serve food and beverages in reusable containers. The company has expanded the practice to 13 campuses in total — including those of Samsung Electronics, Samsung SDI and Samsung Display — using the Suwon campus as the base model.

Kim then visited the Greater Seoul Resource Circulation Center in Yongin to observe the dismantling of refrigerators and air conditioners, the proper handling of refrigerants, and a circular economy regulatory sandbox site where critical minerals such as copper, aluminum and rare-earth permanent magnets are separated and sorted.

Based on the results of the "permanent magnet recovery demonstration project" operating under the circular economy regulatory sandbox, the ministry plans to revise recycling standards and reform related regulations to help establish a permanent magnet recovery and recycling system in the field.


thlee@heraldcorp.com