Korea Electric Power Corp. (KEPCO) held a board of directors’ meeting at KEPCO Art Center on August 8 and approved a proposal for the establishment of KEPCO Engineering College (tentative name) and corporate contribution.
KEPCO will continue to push ahead with its plan to open the college in March 2022, including the establishment of a school corporation in the second half of this year.
Recently, the KEPCO is in dire need of finding new growth engines to secure sustainability as the era of the great change, such as low-carbon, digital, and decentralization, has arrived amid the huge trend of global climate change adaptation and the fourth industrial revolution, a KEPCO official said.
In response, KEPCO Engineering College is expected to lead KEPCO's future business and the creation of new markets by providing core human resources and fostering new energy industries as a "new research platform" to innovate energy technologies, he said.
KEPCO leads the establishment of the college as the nation's largest state-run energy company, and hopes to expand its performance in the country and region with stable central and local governments’ supports.
The commercialization of the college’s R&D results will contribute to KEPCO's long-term interests such as enhancing the value of businesses and shareholders by creating new added value and jobs, the official said.
The KEPCO Engineering College aims to become a "small but strong" college with 600 graduate students and 400 undergraduates. The school will be opened as a single department and aims to be specialized in an energy industry-academic-industrial cluster by operating a convergence curriculum centered on problem-solving projects.