Korea’s Offshore Wind Act marked a significant moment in how offshore wind is planned, coordinated, and delivered. The Act establishes a more systematic framework for identifying development areas, coordinating stakeholders, and supporting investment. By doing so, it brings the potential to provide greater clarity and predictability for projects, while helping Korea accelerate the deployment of offshore wind. Its implementation will be critical to balancing national energy ambitions with the interests of local communities, industry, fisheries, and other stakeholders.
The Act mandates a public-private council is established during the zone designation process. Existing guidelines for public-private councils often have inconsistencies, uneven representation, closed operations, and no dedicated support structures in place.
This project looked at a series of existing precedents to help provide design principles and operational frameworks for
public-private councils. Drawing on the six structural factors identified in the Case Study report below, we put forward a series of design principles for the council, including an operational system covering formation, composition, operation, conflict management, and mutual benefit.
Design Principles
The Design Principles report sets out six recommendations to guide future government-led offshore wind projects, helping public-private councils operate according to consistent standards and enhance resident acceptability. Each of the below has a number of clarifying content and supporting points.
- The design of fair and effective councils based on preliminary investigations must be mandated.
- Establish a permanent support system that can guarantee expertise, independence, and sustainability.
- The composition of representative councils, combining acceptability and expertise, must be enshrined in legislation.
- Procedures for transparent and efficient meeting operation must be guaranteed.
- A systematic three-stage conflict management mechanism must be established to resolve deadlocks.
- Institutionalise substantive mutual benefit measures centred on ‘mutual profit-sharing’ rather than merely ‘compensation’.
Taken together, the recommendations are intended not only to improve consultation procedures, but to also strengthen the legitimacy, predictability, and effectiveness of offshore wind governance in South Korea.
Designing Public-Private Councils Under Korea's Offshore Wind Act
Download PDFThis guide presents the design principles and operational framework for the public-private council under Korea’s Offshore Wind Act, with the aim of establishing an institutional foundation for securing social acceptance.
한국의「해상풍력 보급 촉진 및 산업 육성에 관한 특별법(해상풍력법)」에 따른 민관협의체 설계
Download PDF본 지침서는 사회적 수용성을 확보하기 위한 제도적 기반을 마련하고자 사례연구에서 도출한 6가지 성공 요인에 기반해 해상풍력법 민관협의체의 설계 원칙과 운영 체계를 제시한다.
Case Studies
Properly designed consultation should be viewed as critical project infrastructure, helping to reduce uncertainty, improve investment confidence, and support timely project delivery. This report found that the common feature of successful overseas cases was a structure that enforced early consultation, ensured transparency, and shared benefits. This was in contract to case in Korea of conflict as a result of structural problems such as the absence of consultation procedures, unclear representation and information asymmetry.
What Makes Offshore Wind Consultation a Success?
Download PDFThis report analyses consultation models from the UK, Japan and Denmark alongside domestic cases, deriving six structural factors that determine whether consultation works in practice.
해상 풍력 협의의 성공 요인은 무엇인가?
Download PDF이 보고서는 영국, 일본, 덴마크의 해상풍력 이해관계자 협의 모델과 국내 사례를 분석하여, 협의가 실제로 효과를 발휘하는지 여부를 결정하는 6가지 구조적 요인을 도출한다.
Six structural factors
- Enshrine the legal force of consultation in the Enforcement Decree.
- Bring consultation forward to before the basic design plan is finalised.
- Reflect the legal standing of fishering cooperatives and fishing village associations in the consultation structure.
- Establish an integrated offshore wind information platform and expert working group.
- Institutionalise generation-linked benefit-sharing and long-term monitoring.
- Design the full process as an integrated system, not a set of individual measures.