A figure putting electricity charges at 35% of steel production costs appeared in presentation materials at a National Assembly forum on Sept. 9, 2026. The materials did not say who produced the calculation or what year it was based on. At the forum, the point of contention was how far the system should back the decarbonization transition of power-intensive traditional industries.
The event held in Yeouido that day was titled the "National Energy Industry Strategy Forum for the K-GX (Carbon-Free Transition) Era." Participants saw the current PPA scheme as too narrow for power-intensive sectors such as steel and petrochemicals to speed up the decarbonization transition while holding on to price competitiveness. PPAs are currently limited to renewable energy.
Rep. Park Jung of the National Assembly's Climate, Energy, Environment and Labor Committee said the power sources eligible for PPAs should be widened to carbon-free sources other than renewable energy. He added that steel and petrochemicals have long supported economic growth and employment. Remarks naming nuclear power, SMRs and hydrogen together as candidates for the expansion also came out at the forum, but the descriptions varied from presentation to presentation on how far the agreed demand reached.
The most specific demand came from POSCO.
POSCO pointed to electricity costs as the biggest obstacle to steel decarbonization and argued that the range of carbon-free power options should be widened from renewable energy to nuclear power. That was followed by a request to allow power from Wolsong Unit 1 to be supplied under a PPA or to revise the relevant rules. The company said the survival of the domestic steel industry should be treated as a more urgent matter than the financial condition of Korea Electric Power Corp., and said that if steel competitiveness collapses the effects will spread to autos, shipbuilding and construction. POSCO is classified as a high-carbon-emitting company and released official ESG materials in June 2026.
The presentation materials also included an explanation of supply stability. Sectors that require 24-hour continuous operation can keep up decarbonization facility investment only if power is not cut off. By the same logic, AI, data centers and semiconductors were also mentioned as areas that need a stable supply of large volumes of power.
There was also discussion on the design of the system. Four needs and principles for legislating the green industry transition were presented, and the first one listed was predictability. The point was that for companies to take on decarbonization facility investment with long payback periods and high risk, there must be a legal commitment that outlasts changes of government and budget cycles. It was also pointed out that realizing K-GX requires sorting out overlaps between ministries.
Differences remained over the nature of the forum. Accounts of the same event split between those describing it as a discussion at the review stage and those describing it as a proposal for expansion. What answer Korea Electric Power Corp. or the responsible ministries will give to the demand was not revealed at the venue that day. Nor were there any numerical estimates presented on how opening carbon-free PPAs would affect electricity rates and KEPCO's finances.
For the steel industry's demand to move into actual rules, the current system defining the power sources eligible for PPAs would have to be revised. When and in which ministry that revision process begins remains to be seen. If the basis on which the 35% of costs ratio was calculated is disclosed, this debate will move past the stage of competing preferences over the power mix and into the territory of cost verification.
