靑, to a senior official of the Ministry of Industry, “manipulate the coefficient, press the KHNP”

It was reported on the 14th that the prosecution had secured a statement that former Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Paik Woon-gyu and then Chehee-bong, then the Blue House industrial policy secretary, instructed and pressed Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power to manipulate the economic feasibility evaluation coefficient (variable) of the Wolseong nuclear power plant in 2018. In early April of the same year, former Minister Baek was accused of abuse of ex officio and disrupting work by force by instructing KHNP to write a false letter of intent, saying, “The more the Wolseong nuclear power plant is operated, the more deficit occurs.”

It is also said that Chae, a former secretary (currently the president of the Gas Corporation), gave unreasonable instructions to officials of the Ministry of Industry around April 2 of the same year, such as “manipulate the coefficients” and “press KHNP”.

Summarizing the JoongAng Ilbo coverage, Minister Baek instructed KHNP to write a false letter of intent in April 2018 through officials from the Ministry of Industry, stating, “The Wolseong nuclear power plant runs and operates, the more deficits occur.”


The prosecution believes that KHNP’s false report, which was made by former Minister Baek, played a decisive role in changing the position of the Atomic Energy Safety Commission’s decision to extend the life to a permanent suspension at the end of 2019.. The Wonan Committee had previously decided to’restart the operation by extending 10 years until 2022′ after completing safety inspections in 2015, three years after the 30-year design life of the Wolseong nuclear power plant.

In March 2018, the Ministry of Industry was aiming to operate the Wolsong nuclear power plant until at least 2020, but the atmosphere has changed rapidly. This was because the Blue House began to pressure KHNP to immediately shut down the operation. Unfortunately, the first inter-Korean summit, scheduled for April 27, 2018, was imminent.

On April 2nd, the former secretary of the Ministry of Industry, Park Mo, and the two executives of the Office of the Office of Industrial Policy Secretary of the Blue House on April 2 said, “We manipulated the coefficients to stop the Wolseong nuclear power plant right away.” It is said that pressure was applied after giving unreasonable instructions such as “Press KHNP”. Employees of the Ministry of Industry reported this to Jeon Baek in real time.

The next day, April 3 When Mr. Baek reported, “Immediate shutdown of the Wolseong nuclear power plant is a legal responsibility problem of the KHNP director, so it will be operated for a limited time until 2020, the period of permission for permanent suspension of the Wonan Committee,” he said, “Will you die? Immediately discontinue and rewrite the report.” The reason that former Minister Baek rebuked Jung was reportedly because President Moon Jae-in received a report that asked the Blue House aide the day before, “When will the Wolseong nuclear power plant shutdown?”.

In the end, KHNP received an immediate shutdown order from the Blue House and former Ministers Baek, manipulated the core economic evaluation coefficients, and on June 15 of the same year, the board of directors decided to immediately stop the operation of Wolsong Unit 1 based on a false economic evaluation report. Subsequently, in February of the following year, it applied for permission to change the operation of Wolseong Unit 1 permanently to the Wonan Committee.

The final decision on nuclear power plants is not at the discretion of the government or KHNP, but is approved by the Nuclear Safety Committee, which includes external experts. Nuclear power plants can be put into operation after approval by the National Security Council according to the National Energy Basic Plan, and the same goes for shutdown. This means that the government needed objective data to persuade these members.

The prosecution believes that it would have been the purpose of fooling experts in the Yuan Security Council to have the former Minister Baek write a false report that manipulated the numbers in a way that increased the break-even point and lowered the normal utilization rate. This coincides with the upside-down of the economic evaluation of the accounting firm entrusted by KHNP to external services.

According to the audit result of the Audit and Inspection Service, the S Accounting Firm in charge of the economic feasibility evaluation of the Wolseong nuclear power plant In the initial evaluation on May 3, 2018, the economic feasibility of the continued operation of the Wolseong nuclear power plant was evaluated as a surplus of 2772 billion won.. However, after meeting with the Ministry of Industry and KHNP officials several times, The final evaluation report on June 11 of the same year ‘-9.1 billion won’ deficitConcluded with. Under the pressure of the Ministry of Industry, the core factors of economic evaluation, the utilization rate (85% → 60%) and the selling price (average 63.11 won → 51.52 won per 1 kWh) were drastically lowered, and the’surplus’ nuclear power plant turned into a’deficit’ nuclear power plant.

However, during the examination of the warrant of arrest on the 8th, Baek insisted that “we did not instruct or intervene to correct the economic feasibility factor of the Wolseong nuclear power plant.” Even when the Ministry of Industry officials stated that they had reported the process one by one, he refuted with the effect that “I don’t remember at all, and the alibi is not right because some are on a business trip abroad.” Former secretary Chae did not respond with the phone turned off to the JoongAng Ilbo’s request for admission.

Reporter Jung Yujin [email protected]