South Korea Ranks High in Smart Grid, Air Pollution

 If you’re looking for countries that have aggressive goals for economic growth, you certainly need to include South Korea on your list. What they’ve done in automotive and electronics over the past two decades has been most impressive. Here’s a story about their goals in exporting smart grid solutions. I won’t be at all surprised to see those goals met—and exceeded.

While they’re at it, however, I suggest they invest in deploying smart grid (and energy efficiency, storage, and renewables) internally. I met a young lady in her early 20s a year or so back who was returning to the U.S. after a 15-month stint as an English teacher in Seoul. She asked me if I noticed that she had a raspy voice, and, in an effort to be candid, I admitted that I did; it was horribly pronounced. “My voice was fine when I arrived. You can cut the air over there with a knife and fork.”

That’s not a huge exaggeration; Korea was ranked 136th out of 146 countries in the 2002 Environmental Sustainability Index, and 120th out of 122 countries for air quality, though they’ve made a concerted effort to clean this up.