환경친화적 신․재생에너지의 보급 확대를 위한 법․정책적 개선방안 - 신․재생에너지 의무할당제와 관련하여 -

After COP21, the spreading consensus on reduction of greenhouse gases is working as an opportunity to accelerate spread of new and renewable energy, and major international organizations such as IEA are recently also considering new and renewable energy as the key menas for reducing greenhouse gases. The importance of new and renewable energy is rising every day for countermeasures for climate change, energy security, and future growth engine of countries. New and renewable energy is renewable energy that replaces the conventional energy, which uses fossil fuel (coal, oil, natural gas) and nuclear power, by using characteristics and usages of a variety of natural energy such as solar power, wind, rain, and tidal currents, which are not exhausted. This paper aims to examine spread of eco-friendly new and renewable energy in legal and political terms in relation to the renewable portfolio standard (RPS) with special emphasis on energy-related laws in the Republic of Korea, especially the Act on the Promotion of the Development, Use and Diffusion of New and Renewable Energy. Of course, there are already a lot of earlier studies in interdisciplinary terms. Therefore, this paper cites the earlier studies and summarizes them in the aspect of laws and policies. Though the Constitution of the Republic of Korea does not directly regulate energy, it is reasonable to regard that ‘resources’ in Article 120 Clause 1 of the Constitution include energy that has the properties of resources. Therefore, ‘the Act on the Promotion of the Development, Use and Diffusion of New and Renewable Energy’ can be picked as one of energy-related laws that have materialized the Article. The Act on the Promotion of the Development, Use and Diffusion of New and Renewable Energy is enacted in order to diversity energy sources by accelerating spread of new and renewable energy and to preserve the environment and improve national welfare by promoting stable supply of energy, eco-friendly conversion of energy structure, and reduction of emission of greenhouse gases, and in this connection, the Republic of Korea can be considered to redeem its Constitutional duty. Below summarized legislative improvements on the Act on the Promotion of the Development, Use and Diffusion of New and Renewable Energy and political suggestions for spreading eco-friendly new and renewable energy on the strength of earlier studies. In substitution for conclusion, the RPS is a system that has been enforced from 2012 to make it a duty for power generation providers (compulsory suppliers) with a certain size (500MW）of or greater power generation facilities to supply a certain ratio or greater of the total power generation volume by using new and renewable energy according to the Article 12 of the Act on the Promotion of the Development, Use and Diffusion of New and Renewable Energy. The RPS can easily accomplish a political target volume through compulsory assignment and reduce power generation costs by facilitating competition between power generation providers. Thus, it has been recognized as an alternative to settle the issues of the Feed-in Tariff(FIT). Meanwhile, 11 National Assembly Members proposed a ‘bill to partially revise the Act on the Promotion of the Development, Use and Diffusion of New and Renewable Energy’ focusing on reintroduction of the FIT on 18 July 2016 to attract the attention. The FIT is a system that, when a production cost of a power generation provider is different from a standard price notified by the Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy, supports the difference in amount in order to activate supply of new and renewable energy. It was abolished at the same time as the RPS was enforced in 2012. According to the National Assembly Member who proposed the bill as a representative, the profitability of small new and renewable energy power generation providers with 100 kW or lower of power generation capacity has severely worsened in accordance with the abolition of the FIT. Accordingly, it is difficult for new and renewable energy production by small distributed generations to spread. Also, it is pointed out that power generation businesses using new and renewable energy such as citizen’s power stations, which are voluntarily operated by citizens, village energy business, and solar power cooperatives financed by citizens may shrink to go against the policies for activating new and renewable energy promoted by the government. Therefore, it is totally agreed to the opinion that if the FIT is stopped and only the RPS is enforced, the possibility of small new and renewable energy providers to survive may be lowered, and institutional support is needed for small new and renewable energy suppliers to coexist also for diversification of new and renewable energy supply.