The South Korean battery industry is highly optimistic following the government’s joint announcement with Samsung Group and SK Group regarding the "three mega projects for Korea's great leap." This massive national initiative includes building a cutting-edge semiconductor cluster in Gwangju and South Jeolla, alongside establishing 18.4 gigawatts (GW) of artificial intelligence (AI) data centers nationwide by 2035. Industry experts project that Samsung SDI and SK On, the battery subsidiaries of the respective conglomerate groups, stand to benefit significantly more than competitor LG Energy Solution, due to their parent companies leading the semiconductor and data center construction roadmaps. The specific focus on the Gwangju and South Jeolla regions is highly strategic, as these areas possess abundant renewable energy infrastructure, currently yielding a combined 7.53 GW from solar and wind power generation. Because renewable energy is inherently intermittent, large-scale Energy Storage Systems (ESS) are critically required to stabilize the national electricity grid, absorb peak demand, and prevent transmission buffering issues. According to strict industry estimates, backing up just 1 GW of renewable power for two hours requires a battery capacity of 2 GWh; using standard lithium iron phosphate (LFP) cells priced at an average of $55 per kilowatt-hour (kWh), attaching adequate ESS to the region's current renewable capacity will demand an investment of approximately $825 million (around 1.27 trillion won). Concurrently, data centers must operate non-stop and heavily rely on robust battery networks as an emergency backup to bridge the crucial five-to-fifteen-minute gap between an unexpected power blackout and the startup of emergency backup generators. The infrastructure roadmap dictates a two-phase rollout, where private conglomerates including SK Group, GS Group, and Naver will invest over 1,000 trillion won by 2035 to achieve the full 18.4 GW capacity, with a front-loaded investment of 800 trillion won by 2029 for the first 8.4 GW phase. Since a single 1 GW data center requires roughly 300 MWh of storage capacity—equivalent to the batteries of 3,750 electric vehicles—building out the complete 18.4 GW network will require an immense battery supply valued between $1.38 billion and $1.93 billion (up to 2.99 trillion won). The unprecedented scale of these simultaneous mega-projects presents a massive domestic supply chain challenge that Korea's top three battery manufacturing giants may struggle to meet with current capacity. For instance, LG Energy Solution's existing ESS production lines are reportedly fully booked, though the firm plans to manufacture 1 GW of ESS-use LFP batteries in North Chungcheong starting in 2027. Meanwhile, SK On is actively converting part of its facility lines in Seosan to secure 3 GWh of LFP capacity, and Samsung SDI is similarly repurposing automotive battery lines in Ulsan and the United States for grid storage purposes. Consequently, industry officials stress that local manufacturers are waiting for the central government to formalize exact deployment timelines and strict regulatory guidelines before adjusting their factory production schedules to fulfill this massive wave of domestic tech-driven energy demand. (ICE SEOUL)

Fonte notizia: CHOSUN BIZ