What comes to mind when you hear the word 'Greenhouse Gas Reduction and Carbon Neutrality'?
For some reason, it feels far from the daily life of citizens.
However, in an apartment complex in the middle of Seoul, carbon emission is reduced through energy use efficiency, and at the same time, solar panels are installed on the verandas of each household to significantly lower energy usage fees, thereby reducing carbon and reducing energy costs at the same time. There is.
This is the 2nd Shindonga Family Complex in Segok-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.
Song Jin-guk, who took over as the apartment's tenant representative in 2015, was an ordinary resident who had nothing to do with greenhouse gas or energy conversion at the time.
Appointed as the occupant president, his interest was just how to lower the apartment management fee.
The first idea to save on maintenance was to replace the fluorescent lights in the underground parking lot in the apartment with LED lights.
If you replace a 36W fluorescent lamp with a 20W LED, you can save about 40% on electricity bills, but the brightness of the 20W LED is brighter than that of a 36W fluorescent lamp.
How did you come up with the cost for this?
Chairman Song said that there was a way to get help when he sold his feet.
First, we applied to participate in the energy efficiency project implemented by the Gangnam-gu Office and received 50% of the total construction cost of 50 million won.
The remaining 20 million won was covered by the additional vehicle parking fee collected from the residents while operating the underground parking lot of the apartment.
It is an additional vehicle parking fee paid by residents when parking registration of more than the standard number of vehicles per household.
However, Chairman Song explains that even in this case, the additional vehicle parking cost was restored in a year and two months through the reduced electricity cost thanks to the installation of LED lights in the underground parking lot.
Based on this experience, the Shindong-A Familiar Complex 2 is rolling up its arms to participate in the full-scale energy efficiency improvement project.
They applied for and was selected for the Energy Independent Village Project promoted by the Seoul Metropolitan Government in 2016.
The Seoul Energy Self-Reliance Village Project is a project to increase energy independence through energy efficient production, led by village residents, and subsidies are given to selected villages.
The Shin Dong-a Family received support of 50 million won from the Seoul Metropolitan Government for three years.
Through this, we carry out the business of replacing street lights and common area lights in the complex where halogen bulbs are installed with LED lights or solar power.
In addition, the subsidy will be used to conduct energy efficiency education for residents.
The energy independence challenge of Chairman Song and Dong-ah Shin's family does not stop at conserving electricity, but also leads to direct generation of electricity through renewable energy. In 2016, we started the business of installing 320W solar panels on the verandas of each household, and so far, 312 households, or 76% of the total 410 households, have installed solar panels. It's not easy to see solar panels stacked on top of each other in an apartment building in the middle of downtown Seoul.
Of the 600,000 won installation cost, about 500,000 won was supported through the Seoul veranda solar power installation project, and the remaining around 100,000 won was borne by each household. It is said that on average, electricity is generated for about 3 hours a day through this veranda solar power, and 35KW of electricity is produced per month. The average monthly electricity consumption of a family of four in Korea is 350KW, so it can be said that 1/10 of the monthly electricity bill is saved.
Not only this. A solar panel for the roof was installed on each roof of the apartment. The capacity is 153KW. The electricity produced here is first used for common areas such as apartment parking lots and street lights. And the remaining small amount of electricity is supplied to the general household. The cost of installing solar power on the roof was 140 million won, of which about 30 million won was received by the Seoul Metropolitan Government in the name of supporting the solar power rental business. The rest of the cost, which is about 100 million won, is paid 1.2 million won every month to solar power equipment companies over 7 years in the name of solar panel rental. However, even for this, there is practically no share that the residents directly bear. This is because the amount of electricity produced by rooftop solar power exceeds the rent level. It is said that the income generated through electricity production was used to write off apartment maintenance fees paid by residents once every two years. We also discounted apartment management fees by 50% for 4 months this year, and the funds were provided through energy efficiency and solar electricity production.
We took a look at the actual electricity bills for specific households in the Shindong-A Familia apartment. In the case of Chairman Song's household, the annual electricity bill in 2016 was 495,520 won. (In-household charge: 351,790 won, public electricity bill: 143,730 won) This is an average of 41,300 won per month. It is confirmed that the electricity bill was paid 223,610 won per year in 2020. (In-household charge 203,490 won, public electric bill 17,120 won) This is a 55% decrease compared to 2016. In the case of public electricity bills, the effect of saving was particularly large. It decreased by nearly 90% in 4 years, and in the 2nd and 3rd quarters, the public electricity bill was 'zero'. This is because the amount of power generated by rooftop solar panels increases in the second and third quarters when sunlight is good compared to winter. Of course, not only solar electricity generation but also energy efficiency would have had a big impact on this. Chairman Song explained that daily life practices such as replacing household lights with LEDs and switching to power-saving outlets to save standby power wasted by plugging them in even when not in use had a significant impact on reducing energy bills.
As the benefits of energy efficiency and electricity production became a reality, residents' interest in energy conservation increased significantly. They planned programs such as energy education and environmental concerts for residents as well as visits to eco-friendly energy facilities, and it is said that the participation and response of the residents was very high each time.
What is the secret to the successful energy conversion of Shin Dong-a's Familia Apartments?
First of all, there was a leader who led energy efficiency improvement with interest and passion like Chairman Song Jin-guk.
It is also important to note that he was the president of the apartment tenant representatives' association, which had the right to implement various ideas into actual policies within the complex.
Before Chairman Song was elected as the chairman of the representative association, he suggested the conversion of the underground parking lot to LED, but it was not pursued due to the indifference of the former tenant representatives.
In the case of Donga Shin Familia, I see both the feasibility and difficulties of promoting citizen-participatory energy transition.
There are very few residents who will roll up their arms like Chairman Song and put the time and effort into it.
However, the experience of Chairman Song is that if there are interested people, there are various energy conversion business support policies at the city hall and ward offices, and there are enough opportunities.
Wouldn't it be a meaningful attempt to reduce energy costs by reducing energy conversion and greenhouse gas emissions through direct participation by citizens in the face of the rapidly rising climate change crisis?
I think the story of Dong-a Shin's family will be a great compass for someone who is worried about climate and energy issues somewhere in the forest of apartments that spread out under the Seoul sky, so I'm leaving this record.
(Photo coverage: VJ Shin So-young)
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