Environment ministry announces new national renewable-energy setback caps

The environment ministry said the cabinet approved national caps on local renewable-energy setback rules, citing disparate ordinances across 129 of Korea's 228 basic local governments that have reduced permit predictability and constrained project locations. Existing local rules range from 100 to 1,000 meters for solar facilities and from 100 to 2,000 meters for wind facilities.

The revision takes effect Sept. 18 alongside an amended renewable-energy law. Local governments whose ordinances exceed the new ceilings must ease them, and the ministry said it will hold briefings for basic local governments nationwide before the law takes effect. The decree also separates renewable-energy rules from new-energy rules, including hydrogen, under the respective renewable-energy and hydrogen laws.

For solar projects, local ordinances may require no more than 200 meters between facilities and residential areas containing at least five homes. They may no longer set a distance requirement from roads. Wind projects face a ceiling of 1,500 meters from qualifying residential areas and 500 meters from roads. The rules also require a minimum separation equal to twice a facility's height. Resident-participation facilities, rooftop solar projects and solar facilities used for self-consumption are exempt from setback rules.

"The revision establishes national caps on setback distances that varied between regions, improving the predictability of renewable-energy projects while taking community acceptance into account," Lee Gyeong-su, the ministry's director general for renewable energy policy, said. The ministry has set a target of deploying 100 gigawatts of renewable energy by 2030.