After the fourth Middle East war, in October 1973, the Dubai crude oil price jumped from $2.9 per barrel to $11.6 per barrel due to an increase of oil price and reduction of crude oil production by the OPEC nations. At that time, Korea had taken her first step into the industrialization of the country, however, due to the first oil shock, the rate of inflation increased to 24.8% in 1974 from 3.5% in 1973, and Korea's economic growth halved to 7.4% from 12.3%. During the second oil shock in 1979, Korean economic growth recorded even minus growth. Due to the lack of natural resources, Korea imports almost of the needed energy and thus most of the energy production cost is the fuel cost. Since the dependency of imported oil upon the Middle East is extremely high compared to other countries, Korean energy supply system is very vulnerable to the situation of the Middle East. What strategy is available for us to mitigate the external impacts on this weak energy supply system and still maintaining international competitiveness of various industry sectors?

Human history is evolved by the revolutions or progresses through the Crises. The most important factor of the first industrialization in England was a fuel crisis due to exhaustion of wooden fuel. However, the history progressed to current human prosperity through the remarkable reversal of the "Industrial Revolution". Recent industrialization triggered by the "Industrial Revolution" now prompts a new crisis to human being. Fossil fuel is basically a limited energy resource. Crude oil is known to last only for 40.6 years, natural gas for 65.1 years and coals for 155 years. The abuse of the fossil fuels inevitably generates CO₂ gas, which is the main cause of the greenhouse effects. Recently, many nations now join the international climate change agreements and promote compulsory obligation of national greenhouse gas reduction. Korea generates 10th largest greenhouse gas in energy sector and thus need to develop policy measures to deal with the greenhouse gas issues. What alternative is available for us to meet a stable supply of large electricity needed for maintaining national competitiveness without generating greenhouse gas?

The solution for the two questions mentioned above is surely the "Nuclear Power". Power generating cost for nuclear power is 39 Won/kWh as of 2008 compared to 195Won for oil, 144Won for natural gas, and 54Won for coal, respectively. It is expected that there will be an additional increase of 25Won in power generating cost for coal if Korea joins the industrialized countries which hold the legally binding obligation of greenhouse gas reduction and thus added emission gas tax defined in the Kyoto Protocol. Furthermore, the ratio of fuel cost to the power generating cost is 10% for nuclear power compared 50 - 80% for the coal and the uranium mines are widely spreaded in the world. In other words, the impacts due to the uranium price or international situations are relatively very minimal. Also, the nuclear power is a environment-friendly energy which generates no CO₂ during operation, stably produces and supplies large electricity and thus the nuclear power is the most realistic solution for maintaining national competitiveness and at the same time participating in the international effort of greenhouse gas reduction. For this reason, Korean government established the first national energy policy of reducing fossil fuel and increasing total nuclear installation up to 41% (59% in power generation) by 2030. According to the fourth comprehensive power supply plan, 12 additional nuclear power plants will be constructed by 2022. Nuclear Power is now surging in Nuclear Renaissance as the main player of so called "Low CO₂ Green Growth".

Since the first nuclear power plant in Korea, Kori-1, commenced commercial operation in 1978, nuclear power generation growed rapidly and played a major role for enhancing national competitiveness by a stable supply of electricity. The dream of nuclear power plant construction has been started as a steppingstone of hope from the despair in the 1950s and the scars of Korean war, and the dream now in a half century has flourished with remarkable accomplishments observed by the world. Based on the nuclear power generation, Korea became the fifth in the world and its operation and maintenance technology became the top level in the world. Capacity factor in Korea was 93.4% in 2008 and recorded as the first in the world and has overtaken U.S.A. where the nuclear power was originated. It was possible because of the excellency in operation and maintenance technology of the KHNP and excellency in nuclear fuel of KEPCO NF. KEPCO NF was founded in 1982 as a public corporation and a subsidiary of KEPCO with a goal of nuclear fuel technology self-reliance and localization of the technology. After the commercial production of the nuclear fuel of the PWR in 1989, KEPCO NF supplies both PWR and PHWR nuclear fuel for 20 nuclear power plants currently operating in Korea. KEPCO NF also performs reactor core design and safety analysis to make the nuclear fuel produce electricity safely and economically.

The history of KEPCO NF has a common orbit of the history of Korean nuclear fuel development. Since the Kori-1 commenced its commercial operation in 1978, the 1980s and 1990s are the period of localization of the nuclear fuel. At the beginning of the business, due to a lack of domestic technology, KEPCO NF had to import the technology from abroad to localize the nuclear fuel technology. KEPCO NF had technology transfer in PWR fuel design and manufacturing technology from KWU in 1985 and the history of Korean nuclear fuel commenced as KEPCO NF supplied its first domestic nuclear fuel in 1989. The nuclear fuel in this period is called the first generation nuclear fuel. KEPCO NF only had a license to use in Korea without ownership of the technology.
To secure international competitiveness, development of the second generation nuclear fuel started in 1999 as the development of Korean standard nuclear fuel started. During this period, various and rich experiences, accumulated design and manufacturing technology as well as the R&D capability gained during the nuclear fuel technology initiative period had been used. KEPCO NF developed two nuclear fuels with 10% enhancement of thermal performance, PLUS7TM for KSNP and ACE7TM for Westinghouse type plants, and commercially supplies the PLUS7TM nuclear fuel since 2006 by thorough quality assurance system. The PLUS7TM nuclear fuel was selected as an Achievement of Major Scientific Technology and Industrialization in 2005 and this PLUS7TM nuclear fuel will be supplied to the UAE nuclear power plants which was contracted by KEPCO. However, KEPCO NF does not have a complete ownership of the patented technology for the two nuclear fuels and this imposes a limitation on the export of the nuclear fuel. Thus, to remove the limitations on the nuclear fuel export, KEPCO NF launched the X-Gen Project to develop patented nuclear fuel technology in 2005. X-Gen Project is an ambitious plan to complete the development of a high performance and branded nuclear fuel with exclusive ownership as well as a top class design code system and methodology by 2012. The third generation nuclear fuel, HIPER (HIgh Performance with Efficiency and Reliability) will be developed through the X-Gen Project. The HIPER will be an export driven, high performance and branded nuclear fuel, and is expected a leading edge nuclear fuel with 20% increase in burnup performance as well as enhancements in thermal performance, reliability and manufacturability. The HIPER will improve the safety of the operating nuclear power plants and will lead the role of the strategic export product. In the mean time KEPCO NF also prepares for the development of the fourth generation nuclear fuel for the future nuclear power plants, GEN-IV reactors. To meet the future energy demands, the GEN-IV reactors will be jointly developed by the participating 10 countries as the fourth generation reactor adopting revolutionary design concepts for nuclear safety, radioactive waste management, nuclear nonproliferation and public acceptance as well as the economic competitiveness and reliability. Among the six GEN-IV candidate reactor types, Korea is interested in the SFR (Sodium Fast Reactor) and VHTR (Very High Temperature Reactor). KEPCO NF is participating in the development of the TRISO for the VHTR since 2008 and also the development of a metallic nuclear fuel for the SFR since 2009. Since the metallic nuclear fuel for the SFR reuses the transuranium from the PWR spent fuel, it is expected that the uranium utilization will be increased 80 - 100-fold and radioactive waste toxicity will be decreased by 1/1000. It is also expected that it will reduce the amount of nuclear wastes by 1/20, waste management site area by 1/100, and site operating period to 300 years from 300,000 years. Thus, it is expected that the future nuclear fuel will be developed in the direction of maximizing the utilization of the uranium and minimizing the radioactive nuclear wastes.

After a complete stop of nuclear construction since the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, US plans to start building nuclear power plants in 2011 through the USNRC COL (Combined Construction and Operating License) and complete in 2015 - 2016. From a long term perspective, Sweden government declared its national energy policy shift to a termination of the "Ban on Nuclear Construction in Sweden" in February 2009 from the 1980 referendum of the "Ban on Nuclear generation and Operation". England promoted the construction of the next generation nuclear power plant, however, it faced fierce opposition from the NGOs. But, the NGOs announced their strong intents to promote nuclear reactors due to the fact that the promise of the government for reduction of CO₂ emission by 80% in 2050 may be dismissed amongst the debates of the legal regulation and social dispute on nuclear power plants and thus the nuclear construction is considered to be accelerated. As the climate change agreements become effective, countries all over the world now revisit the stable fuel supply, economic and environment-friendly option of nuclear power due to increase in electricity demand, exhaustion of fossil fuel, rapid change of energy price, instability in oil price. The nuclear renaissance is coming. At the same time, countries fiercely fight for the hegemony in the nuclear renaissance. As of 2009, a total of 436 reactors are operating in 31 countries and 43 reactors are under construction in 13 countries. More than 400 new reactors are estimated to be built by 2030. The market is estimated to reach $1.2 trillion dollars. The countries capable of export nuclear power plants are five countries including US, France, Russia, Canada and Japan. In a large sense, the US and France share the international commercial nuclear power market. Recently, KEPCO made an outstanding achievement of winning nuclear power plant contract from the UAE and took its first step to international commercial nuclear power market. Korean government announced its ambitious plan to export 80 nuclear power plants by 2030 and share 20% of the world commercial nuclear market. It shows the government's will to build the domestic nuclear power industry into new export industry.

Responding to the Government's will, KEPCO NF is preparing for the increase in the future electricity demand and the recruitment of competent employees and strategic planning to effectively utilize human resources as well as the timely investments in R&D, and future and patented technology developments. KEPCO NF already made nuclear fuel parts industry into export industry and exports nuclear fuel parts to the US which amounts $10 Million dollars. The KEPCO NF overseas business consists of participating in the One-KEPCO nuclear power plant export business and independent overseas business development. KEPCO NF is participating in the construction of the nuclear power plants in the UAE as well as the nuclear power plant export business development in nuclear importing countries such as Turkey and Malaysia. Also, KEPCO NF is building international cooperations with world wide leading nuclear fuel companies and promotes export business through established overseas business networks including nuclear fuel design and manufacturing, parts, factory equipments, inspection and repair, and engineering services comprising overall nuclear fuel business. In fact, since the nuclear fuel cladding tube manufacturing factory(TSA) has been completed, cladding tubes will be supplied by KEPCO NF and saves annually about $20 Billion Won otherwise imported from abroad and also plans to export overseas. In February 2009, KEPCO NF formed a joint venture, KWN, with WEC in the US to manufacture CEAs (Control Element Assemblies). The establishment of KWN will again demonstrate that KEPCO NF has world class leading nuclear fuel technology. The CEAs manufactured by KWN will be supplied for Shin-kori 4 plant in 2011 as well as all other domestic plants and KWN will export the CEAs to US CE type plants, which is estimated to amount $800 Million dollars annually.

KEPCO NF had imported nuclear fuel technology from nuclear advanced countries, localized the technology, went through a series of technology advancement processes in advanced nuclear fuel and patented technology developments, and, through the experiences, KEPCO NF accumulated competent human resources and technical know-hows. These unique KEPCO NF experiences may serve as an attractive selling point to the new nuclear importing countries due to expected thorough technology transfer from KEPCO NF and this will enhance the competitiveness beyond the nuclear technology itself. There is a saying among nuclear personnel, "Fuel Vendor is forever". This means that the nuclear fuel should be supplied for at least 60 years of plant life after the operation of the nuclear power plant. It is not easy to change the nuclear fuel type during the plant life. As soon as the nuclear fuel market is secured, the profit is continuous and it is expected to amount to the effect of nuclear plant export.

The vision of KEPCO NF is further extended to the world. Utilizing the experiences and competence of supplying nuclear fuels to 20 domestic operating nuclear power plants for last quarter century, KEPCO NF will aggressively market its nuclear fuel everywhere in the world. KEPCO NF's passion for the future never stops.