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South Korea Korea Electric Power Corporation
KEPCO is a government agency whose goal is to provide
abundant electric power and to develop reliable power resources.
The south of Korea traditionally had received its electric power
from power stations in present-day North Korea, but the
P'yongyang government cut off power to South Korea in 1948. The
catastrophes of the Korean War also posed electrical supply
problems. The situation had not improved greatly by 1961 when the
new military junta merged three smaller electric companies to
form the Korea Electric Company (KECO). Seoul invested heavily in
KECO, realizing that adequate sources of power were a basic
prerequisite to industrialization. In 1982 KECO was reorganized
as a public corporation and became known as KEPCO. All shares
were owned by the government. In 1988 Seoul decided to sell 30
percent of all shares to the public.
KEPCO, one of the largest public corporations in South Korea,
with 30,289 employees, serviced about 99.8 percent of the
populace in 1988. It derived about 12 percent of its electricity
from hydroelectric sources, 50 percent from thermal sources
(coal, oil, and gas-fired), and the rest from a growing number of
nuclear power plants. It was hoped that nuclear power would be
developed further to lower reliance on oil, gas, and coal
imports. KEPCO officials pronounced their nuclear power plants
safe from any potential nonmilitary accidents and said that
extraordinary measures had been taken to protect the plants in
case of a North Korean attack.
Data as of June 1990
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