Sustainable energy management in petrochemical plants: an interview with Huh Jun-seok

From the fuel that powers cars to the plastics found in everyday products, modern life depends heavily on the oil refining and petrochemical industries. Yet these industries are also under increasing pressure to reduce their environmental impact. In this interview, Huh Jun-seok at SK Energy's Electrical Engineering Team explained how the company responds to growing ESG and carbon neutrality commitments with various energy-saving measures, as well as the increasing role of AI and digital technologies in energy management.

First, could you tell us about the work you’re currently doing?

I’m in charge of the maintenance and management of electrical equipment at the largest and highest-capacity oil refining and petrochemical plant in South Korea, located in Ulsan. We work at a petrochemical plant that produces the raw materials for all the substances we use in our daily lives, such as gasoline and diesel, as well as the clothes we wear and the plastic tableware in our homes. However, producing those raw materials and substances requires energy sources. That’s why utilities are necessary, and within that context, we play a role in generating, supplying, and managing electricity.

Refineries seem to consume a lot of energy. Do you have any energy-saving measures or implementation plans in place to protect the environment?

In recent years, with the emergence of environmental trends like ESG and Net Zero, there are now obligations at the national and corporate levels to achieve carbon neutrality. Consequently, SK Energy is also making significant efforts to conserve energy. We have a significant energy deficit—not just in steam but also in electricity—to the extent that we rank among the top 10 in the country. To address this, we are producing electricity using more eco-friendly energy sources and utilizing equipment that allows us to consume only 100 units of electricity instead of the 150 units required by conventional systems. This means we don’t incur additional costs, and we are able to sustain our energy conservation efforts.

For example, we now use LED lighting for the ceiling lights, whereas in the past, we did not use LED lighting. Since our factory is 60 years old, we used to use lighting that consumed a lot of power and resulted in high electricity bills, but recently, as technology has advanced, we have switched to high-efficiency LEDs. Furthermore, the majority of the utilities supplying power to our factory are now driven by motors. We use rotating motors to drive pumps, compressors, fans, and other equipment to process products in our production lines. To reduce the electricity consumption of these motors, we’re using high-efficiency motors and inverters—devices that allow us to adjust the motor speed to match our process throughput—which has significantly increased our energy efficiency.

Are there any specific measures you are taking to manage and reduce energy loss while operating such large-scale power systems within the factory?

To reduce energy loss, the efficiency of these air handling systems is essentially fixed once the equipment is manufactured. Whether we should invest additional funds to install more efficient equipment depends on the company’s strategic direction and level of aggressiveness.

In addition to that, to simply improve the efficiency of output relative to input, we manage energy intensity to ensure that only essential loads are used—preventing unnecessary power sources from operating, just as we often do at home. The unit energy consumption is an indicator of how much electrical energy is required to produce a single unit of a product. We believe that by managing this unit energy consumption, we can improve the efficiency you mentioned, so we are now monitoring these figures for each process.

Recently, energy management utilizing digital technology has become increasingly important. I’m curious if SK is also introducing smart energy management systems or automated technologies.

With recent advancements in AI technology, we are striving to utilize AI not only for production but also for reducing utility costs. However, to utilize AI technology, we first need a significant amount of data from our manufacturing plants. For energy-related aspects, we need to measure electricity consumption by time of day and determine if there is any actual waste—to understand these factors, we must first acquire the data. Acquiring that data requires a separate investment, so we are currently in the process of purchasing and installing a large number of meters and sensors. We are also building a data platform using existing data to monitor overall energy usage and align with the AI trends.

As these digital technologies increase, do you feel that using AI allows you to work more efficiently?

In the past, tasks like analyzing data or processing historical records were done manually by people. However, with the emergence of generative AI and the rapid advancement of AI agents, we feel that the efficiency of analyzing data and deriving insights from it has significantly improved compared to the past. 

Recently, the expansion of renewable energy use, such as through initiatives like RE100, has become a major issue. I’m curious if there have been any changes in how refineries are expanding their use of renewable energy or sourcing external power.

For domestic refineries and petrochemical plants, it is currently difficult to establish and join initiatives like RE100. This is because our carbon emissions rank among the highest in the country, comparable to those of the steel industry. However, everyone agrees that renewable energy is necessary. Especially with the introduction of new systems like military energy-specialized zones, while directly connecting renewable energy to our power grid would be ideal, there are also methods involving virtual grids. I believe these approaches will likely expand as we seek to participate in RE100.

But the reason why it is so difficult to expand our refineries and processing plants is that if we were to simply connect renewable energy sources directly to power our plants, we would face a problem. As you know, renewable energy relies primarily on solar and wind power, but on days when there is no sunlight or no wind, we cannot operate the plants. Since our refinery and petrochemical plants must operate continuously 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, renewable energy should be utilized as a supplementary power source. Replacing 100% of our power with renewable energy is still technically difficult at this point.

Although the emissions trading system in Korea is not yet fully active, could you tell us if you are participating in it, or how you are managing the situation given these current challenges?

We are currently participating in the emissions trading system. However, at the domestic level, emissions trading is not yet as active as it is in Europe or other developed countries. That said, with the change in government and policy, and the recent heightened focus on carbon neutrality, there is a renewed push to revitalize carbon emissions trading.

Recently, as Europe has gone through the war between Russia and Ukraine, energy security has become a major concern, and Europe itself has actually become somewhat skeptical about the carbon emissions trading system. So, regarding those aspects, I think that if global geopolitical factors come into play and a global consensus is reached again—and if the Event Tube is relaunched and becomes active—exports to the domestic market might become a bit more active.

Additionally, with the recent rise of AI—which requires massive amounts of electricity—questions about how to meet that demand have come to the forefront as potential alternatives. Consequently, it’s not just about renewable energy; there are now movements in various countries and regions around the world to build new nuclear power plants again. There are also efforts to increase LNG-based power generation.

To give a specific example, if we want to generate electricity using LNG, we need turbines. We need to build gas turbines, but there are only a few manufacturers globally capable of doing so. However, the order books of these few global companies are already completely full. In other words, even as the world faces a crisis that demands greater use of renewable energy, there is a paradoxical trend toward increasing LNG power generation to ensure immediate economic viability and cover part of our current energy needs. Therefore, I would like to emphasize that for the carbon emissions trading system to become more active, renewed global collaborative efforts are necessary.