Sollease E&D to Develop 2GW Scale on 5 Million Pyeong of Salt-Damaged Reclaimed Land in Yeongam, Jeonnam
Prioritizing Social Value Creation with Free Smart Farm Services
Aerial view of the Green New Deal City to be developed in the 3-1 district of the Yeongsan River reclamation area in Samho-eup and Miam-myeon, Yeongam-gun, Jeollanam-do. Photo by Sollease E&D
[Yeongam=Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters, Reporter Seo Young-seo] A large-scale solar power generation complex, the largest in South Korea, is being promoted as a resident participation project in Yeongam, Jeollanam-do.
Sollease E&D announced on the 19th, "We are promoting a large-scale solar power generation complex utilizing saline-damaged farmland on approximately 5 million pyeong of reclaimed land in the Yeongsangang 3-1 district area, including Samho-eup and Miam-myeon in Yeongam-gun, Jeollanam-do."
According to Sollease E&D, this scale produces 2GW (gigawatts) of electricity per hour, equivalent to two nuclear power plant facilities.
This is the largest scale in South Korea and ranks among the top three worldwide. Sollease E&D expects the total project cost to be about 3 trillion won.
Regarding this, Sollease E&D recently commissioned the Eco-friendly Agriculture Center analysis team at Suncheon National University to measure soil salinity at about 180 sites in the Yeongsangang 3-1 district reclaimed land and obtained an average result of 7.65 dS/m (deciSiemens per meter).
This salinity level greatly exceeds the government’s standard for solar power facilities on saline reclaimed land, which is 5.5 dS/m. This secures the project's feasibility as a business site.
This is based on the Agricultural Land Act revised and enacted in July 2019, but to officially secure business feasibility, a formal request must be made to the Korea Rural Community Corporation, paying a measurement fee of 3 million won per hectare.
Prior to this, securing lease contracts with landowners is essential, and Sollease E&D is currently at the stage of securing about 700,000 pyeong of land lease contracts.
Given the scale of the project, the economic impact on the Yeongam local community is also expected to be significant.
The government has set a so-called ‘REC weighting’ to increase the electricity purchase price from power plants when local governments or residents directly participate in solar or wind power projects.
In the case of Sollease E&D’s Yeongam 2GW solar power project, this local government and resident participation weighting is estimated to amount to 1 trillion won over 20 years.
Sollease E&D plans to use this participation weighting to solve local long-standing projects such as smart farms, fig distribution and processing research centers, and Silver Story complexes.
In particular, a 300,000-pyeong smart farm will be established and provided free of charge for 20 years to tenant farmers and self-employed farmers who lose rice farming jobs due to the solar power complex development.
Smart farms have a productivity of 1,000 pyeong comparable to 40,000 pyeong of rice farming and can be fully automated using advanced IT technology, making them the most suitable future farming model in rural areas facing extreme aging.
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