Boosting corporate value through its "JB Project," to build and innovate an integrated information system In today's world of rapidly developing IT technologies, corporate as well as public awareness on their importance has gained momentum to such an extent that it is difficult to see any field of industry that has not applied IT technologies to enhance its competitive edge. And the power-generating business is no exception to this trend. To find out more about how these changes are affecting Korea's power companies, the Korea IT Times interviewed Chung Jang-sup, president of Korea Midland Power (KOMIPO), to find out more about KOMIPO and how the company has adopted IT technologies and reshaped its management to post the largest net profits among power generating companies in the nation. Recently, Korea Midland Power (KOMIPO) won three grand prizes for its achievements made in the fields of productivity, standardization, and green management. What has helped KOMIPO win such awards The reason behind our winning of a national productivity grand prize in the category of "informatization" can be found in the growing recognition for our endeavors to systematically manage intellectual assets and greatly elevate the corporate value through our comprehensive "JB Project" to build and innovate an integrated information system. Having taken part in a government project to standardize capital goods, along with the standardization of over 10 powergenerating facilities, we have also won the grand prize for standardization. Moreover, we are the nation's first company to have provided fly ashes, the byproduct of a coal-powered thermal power plant, to be used as standard construction materials such as highly durable light bricks. Aside from these, we have also stood at the forefront in laying down the Korea Electric Power Industry Code and contributed to the building of Korean standards in the field of power generation. By developing 127 homemade powergenerating facilities such as high-pressure turbines for the supply of electricity at low costs, we have contributed in replacing imports worth 21.2 billion won. Furthermore, KOMIPO has continued to make steps to achieve the goal of reducing air pollution by 70 percent until the year 2010 under our mid and long-term environment management strategy 'ECO 2010'. Also, we have adopted a real-time computing system that can calculate environment costs by building an environment accounting system linked with the Enterprise Resources Planning (ERP). This linkage system makes us the nation's first power generating company to have made such an attempt. What has helped KOMIPO to post the highest net profits among power generating companies in the nation KOMIPO has reshaped its organization based on profitability and has strived to enhance the management efficiency through such means as the fostering of skilled manpower, the adoption of advanced techniques for foreign currency management, and the economical operation of power-generating facilities. Having been chosen as the recipient of a financial assistance program for sound labor relations, we have received recognition from the government and other institutions for our exemplary labor and management relations together with a solid base for a c o r p o r a t e competitiveness. In addition, we have undertaken to make progress in various fields of operations for the company's future growth. In the process, we had made it possible to adopt responsible management and speedy decision-making through the integration of overlapping branches as part of our goal to enhance efficiency in our operations. Also, we were able to manage costs systematically by developing a balance-ofpayments management system on our own for elevating the efficiency in terms of facilities operation. As for the saving of fuel costs and securing stable supplies, we have diversified fuel supplies and pushed forward with the task of improving facility operation techniques and made adjustments to maintenance cycles for enhancing the operability of powergenerating facilities. Could you explain the environment management strategy 'Eco-2010' As the nation's first power-generating company to have adopted environment accounting to our ERP system for realtime analysis of environment costs, we have set the goal of reducing 70% of air pollutants by 2010 from 2000. To achieve this aim, we have installed and have been operating nitrogen oxide emissions control equipment at Seoul Thermal Power plants 4&5, Incheon Thermal Power plants 1&2 and Seocheon Thermal Power plants 1&2. In addition, we have been pushing forward the task of installing pollutants prevention facilities to all our power plants including those under construction for removing such pollutants as sulfides and nitrogen compounds. For the purpose of reducing wastewater from power plants, thermal power plants in Boryung and Seocheon are operated under complete wastewater recycle treatment systems while the recycling ratio of wastewater in Incheon Thermal Power plants has been elevated with the installation of a wastewater purification system. On top of such efforts to reduce pollutants, we are also pushing ahead with an aim to recycle energy resources. By recycling more than 70 percent of coal ash and anhydrites, the by-products of power generation, into concrete materials, we have been posting 10 billion won in profits annually. In times of constructing power plants, too, we have conducted environment impact assessments and adopted a deepwater discharge system to minimize environmental effects from the discharge of hot water. Above all, we have been operating an environment monitoring system in cooperation with local residents and have faithfully executed the agreements we have signed with local governments for our autonomous execution of environment management. Please explain the "JB Information Project" currently under way According to our basic plan laid down in 2002 to expedite an advanced management system based on information, we embarked on the project in earnest in February this year with an aim to fulfill an advanced information system most suitable for a power-generating firm through thorough preparations and the benchmarking of companies with advanced information management systems around the world. The JB project is an integrated information project that manifests the innovation of work process and a real-time business management by building up an integrated information system and redesigning the work process related with facilities, materials, accounting and business management through the adoption of advanced management techniques. The basic direction of the system building is to maximize its benefits by shortening the building process through its total and simultaneous application and stabilizing the system early while minimizing any development task by abiding the solution package standard process. The JB integrated information system has been in operation since early November following the 9 month-long construction of an integrated information system along with the redesigning of operation process and education of employees on specialized subjects. The JB integrated information system will strengthen the activity-based cost management by structuring new data warehouse and strategic enterprise management (SEM). In addition, it will also buttress value-oriented management by building management analysis system and strategic business management utilizing the balanced score card (BSC). Moreover, we plan to build an IT infrastructure suitable for the running of a power generating company by applying international standards and latest technologies in the IT field so that a wide variety of management information can be reflected in real time and facilitate feedback mechanisms for user convenience. The Intelligent P&ID, an electronic diagram we recently adopted, will facilitate the reliable operation of power generating facilities by allowing the real time utilization of facility-related information and bring about an underlying system that can accommodate the operation of automated intelligent power generating facilities based on new IT technologies to be developed in the future. Apart from this, we have introduced mobile technologies to our information network for the maintenance and repair work in a number of power plants such as the Boryung thermal power. As a result, we were able to find out their beneficial effects in terms of mobility and effectiveness to be sufficient. Accordingly, we plan to make similar applications to other thermal power plants including those in Seoul and Jeju.