Research and Development Investment and Collaboration Framework for the Hydrogen Economy in South Korea

Doyeon Lee,Keunhwan Kim

doi:10.3390/su131910686

Abstract

South Korea developed its hydrogen strategies to achieve carbon neutrality and dominate the hydrogen economy amidst, and with the impetus, of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. The government strives toward the goal via continuous investment in green hydrogen technologies, as well as strategic collaborations. To facilitate the transition into the hydrogen economy, this study presents a research and development (R&D) investment and collaboration framework as a national strategy. The framework offers abundant information to elucidate the technology, R&D spectrum, and regional dimensions of the strategy. Furthermore, the proposed framework was applied to the Korean hydrogen economy comprising 955 nationally funded projects worth USD 565.7 million. The statuses and trends of the government’s investment in nationally funded research projects are illustrated with regard to the value chains of the hydrogen economies of 16 regions, as well as nine technology clusters relating to the hydrogen economy, thereby determining the research organizations that played crucial roles in each cluster of the 16 regions between 2015 and 2020. The results indicate that the research organizations in Daejeon acquired the highest government R&D funding in many hydrogen-economy-related research fields, and that an R&D spectrum-based research/strategic collaboration is required to accomplish specialized complexes in the regions.

Highlights

The “hydrogen economy”, which is defined as a society where hydrogen is employed as the energy carrier in its energy system [2], emerged as a term in the early 1970s, following the oil crisis (1973–1974), as a strategy for eradicating the energy dependence of the West on the Middle East [3,4]
This study employed the data of nationally funded research and development (R&D) projects, which were obtained from the National Science & Technology Information Service (NTIS)
Funded Projects Relating to the Hydrogen Economy

Summary

Introduction

The “hydrogen economy”, which is defined as a society where hydrogen (named by Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier in 1783 [1]) is employed as the energy carrier in its energy system [2], emerged as a term in the early 1970s, following the oil crisis (1973–1974), as a strategy for eradicating the energy dependence of the West on the Middle East [3,4]. The hydrogen energy technologies that are based on multienergy systems that correspond to renewable energy, including solar, water, wind, and biomass energies, can improve the energy utilization rate and reduce the cost of hydrogen production and, represent the future of hydrogen energy [18]. The Korean employed in this process, the produced hydrogen becomes a renewable energy carrier, complementary to the applied electricity [9,17]. The hydrogen energy technologies that are based on multi-energy systems that correspond to renewable energy, including 3solar, of 28 water, wind, and biomass energies, can improve the energy utilization rate and reduce the cost of hydrogen production and, represent the future of hydrogen energy [18]. The Korean government has pursued a green hydrogen economy for economic government has security, pursued aand green economy for economic growth,demands energy security, growth, energy an hydrogen environment that aligns with domestic [19]

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Conclusion