Newly Established Japanese-Korean Joint Venture Sets Sights on Offshore Wind

May 10, 2023, by Adrijana Buljan

Japan-based Shizen International, a Shizen Energy Group company, has entered into an agreement with South Korea’s INMARK Asset Management and DOHWA Engineering to form a joint venture that will develop energy storage, onshore renewables and offshore wind projects in South Korea.

The joint venture, which will be called Inmark Jayeon Energy, has already identified 2,000 MW of renewable energy generation project opportunities and plans to make its first investment in a project of approximately 100 MW by the end of this year, Shizen International said in a press release.

The Japanese company is already developing offshore wind projects in Japan, including around Kyushu island, nearby Korea, and says that it will bring this experience to the joint venture which is evaluating projects with similar environmental conditions.

For Shizen, the new joint venture also marks an entry into the South Korean renewable energy market.

“Our entry into the South Korean market is due to the country’s potential for renewable energy deployment”, the company states in the press release from 10 May.

“In 2023, the South Korean government formulated the 10th Basic Plan for Electricity Supply and Demand, which forecasts the share of electricity generated from renewable energy sources in South Korea to become 30.6% by 2036 from 9% in 2021. We believe that renewable energy power generation projects can be expected to be promoted toward the country’s goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050”.

Of Shizen’s two partners, DOHWA Engineering is already involved in one of the South Korean offshore wind projects, the Taean offshore wind farm, located in the Yellow Sea, being developed by Taean Wind Power.

South Korea has set its 2030 offshore wind target at 12 GW in its Renewable Energy 3020 Implementation Plan announced back in 2018.

The target was reaffirmed by now-former President Moon Jae-in in 2020 and, the following year, the South Korean government announced the development of an 8.2 GW wind complex offshore Sinan County, South Jeolla Province, planned to be completed by 2030. Currently, the country is working on a long-term plan for a power grid that would accommodate this capacity.

A few months after the giant offshore wind project was announced in 2021, President Moon Jae-in also revealed the government would invest in the first phase of a project developing a 6 GW floating wind farm offshore Ulsan.