Key Summary

Korea's 12th Basic Plan for Electricity Supply and Demand is being drafted around a 2040 coal exit, with a proposal to phase out 39 domestic coal units reaching their 30-year design life by 2038. Climate, Energy and Environment Minister Kim Sung-hwan framed the decisive variable as retiring the 21 units that still have residual life in an orderly way without adding consumer cost burden or supply disruption, which points to replacement capacity in LNG, nuclear and renewables and to tariff pressure that feeds through to KEPCO's cost structure and to power-intensive industrials. Watch the final plan's unit-by-unit retirement schedule and any capacity-payment or tariff mechanism, since stranded-asset compensation for the 21 residual-life units is the swing factor for utility and power-equipment order books.