| 摘要 | ��
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1. Research Purpose
The recently revived debate on restructuring of the Korean natural gas industry is indeed a decade-old controversy. With the worldwide liberalization and deregulation trend of energy industries in the late 1990s, the Korean government had drawn up a restructuring plan to transform its state monopoly of the natural gas industry into a competitive one in order to enhance efficiency and competitiveness. While the plan has undergone some modifications addressing criticisms and concerns, there has not been much progress in terms of further details and timetable of the restructuring due to continuing disputes over the pros and cons of the competitive gas market.
The arrival of the high oil price era and changed environment of international gas market have complicated the restructuring debate further. Especially, against the backdrop of tightening world LNG supply and rapidly rising gas prices, whether the security of gas supply can be guaranteed in a competitive market has become the central issue in the debate. This has resulted in added uncertainty surrounding the future direction of gas industry. Such uncertainty should be removed as soon as possible, as it could increase investment risk in gas industry and impede efficient decision-making, thus creating implicit social costs. On the other hand, considering the importance of the natural gas in everyday life and the irreversible nature of industry restructuring, the issue of gas supply security takes priority in policy decision-making and warrants careful scrutiny.
As such, this study addresses the issue of whether the security of gas supply can be maintained in a liberalized gas market. By examining various elements that can affect the security of gas supply in a competitive market and reviewing the coherence of arguments raised regarding the issue, this study analyzes how the security aspect can differ in an open gas market, compared to the vertically integrated monopoly market.
2. Summary
The security of gas supply in a monopoly regime is generally seen as taking some physical measures to protect against supply disruption caused by extreme weather, technical problems or political incidents. In a liberalized gas market environment, however, those security aspects that were previously regarded only as technical or managerial measures will be transformed to the matters of economic choices that consequently entail profits and losses.
In a liberalized market, the supply and demand is balanced by the market price that reflects the preferences of market participants. Since the market ensures the gas volume is supplied to the consumers who place highest values, it becomes possible to have various measures to relieve the risks and impacts of supply disruption in a manner consistent with the preferences of market participants. Such market-based measures will make the costs of providing security of supply more transparent in an open market. Moreover, the responsibility of providing security of supply, which lies with the government or the monopoly firm in the monopolized market, will also be transferred to all market players including the suppliers, consumers and the government.
Conflicting views exist regarding the impact of gas market liberalization on the security of supply. Those who view liberalization positively insist that it facilitates supply diversity and flexibility through unfettered movement of gas and expanded customer choices, thereby contributing to security of gas supply. Those who view it negatively are concerned that long-term security would be jeopardized as long-term contracts are less permissible in a competitive market, while long-term contracts are pivotal in bringing about adequate supply considering the large scale investment necessary for developing gas resources.
Seen it in terms of the industry structural point of view, managing the industry by a state monopoly has led to addressing some of the supply security problems while sacrificing operational and allocational efficiency. The argument supporting the monopoly regime based on the higher bargaining power with larger company size or purchasing size neglects various other elements that are at play in import contracting negotiation. The 'national champion' argument presented along the same line with the bargaining power argument, is often criticised for its inconsistency with the premises on which it stands.
The issues raised on investment are reasonable concerns in that, absent regulation, competition may lead to diminishing capacity margin and deter infrastructure investment. As such, careful consideration should be given to ensure proper incentives to invest in infrastructure. Since the operation of supply infrastructure and its investment are likely to be subject to regulation as it exhibits increasing returns to scale, the concerns can mostly be dealt with in the standard manner of addressing investment incentive by adjusting the allowed rate of return. In addition, in order to ensure efficient operations of the liberalized market, some intervention by the regulatory authority to induce precautionary investment in preparation for 'low probability & high impact' incidents may be necessary.
As the market clearing price responds to the supply and demand situations, price volatility is inevitable and in a sense desirable in a competitive market. Nevertheless, since excessive volatility can hamper confidence in market and threaten reliability of supply, it should also be the subject of regulatory supervision along with the matter of price manipulation in an open market.
3. Research Results and Policy Suggestions
The liberalization of natural gas market is not incompatible with ensuring security of gas supply. The market liberalization can contribute positively to security of supply, by enabling market-based mechanisms to deal with supply disruption possibility and raising overall flexibility and efficiency of the gas supply system. However, it also entails new types of risks such as higher price volatility and diminishing infrastructure capacity margin. Moreover, the market mechanism can have its limitation at times as there exists the possibility of insufficient demand responses to price. Therefore, the role of the government in security of supply is still important in the liberalized market, especially in terms of providing a minimum acceptable security guideline and safety standards, protection of small customers and emergency response measures.
This study presents the following policy suggestions on security of gas supply and introducing competition to the industry. First, current 'rolled-in' pricing practice needs to be reformed in order to strengthen security of supply and enhance the efficiency of gas procurement, as it inherently creates inefficiency in importing gas. Specifically, it induces importing gas even when the marginal willingness to pay is lower than the marginal cost of imported gas due to the practice of applying the weighted average of all import prices as the supply price. This results in excessive demand for gas imports and increases the exposure to the risks of supply disruption.
Second, any temptation to place limitation on the total import volume or to assign an allowable import volume to each supplier based on calculation of the total projected demand and the secured volume should be refrained, even though such measures are often suggested. It is not only incompatible with the efficient working of a competitive market, but also restrict suppliers' ability to response to any unexpected supply disruption.
Third, expansion of storage facility is important in security of supply in light of the severe demand seasonality. On the other hand, there exists a trade-off between the investment in storage facility and the high gas import cost in winter. As such, in providing the minimum regulatory obligation for security of supply to suppliers, it would be desirable to provide a composite guideline that can lead to an optimal mix of storage facility investment and various market-based measures that suppliers can utilize such as securing interruptible demands, reflecting the relative costs of all relevant measures, rather than simply providing an obligation on storage facility.
118 pages, 73 refs., 3 tabs., 1 Figs., Language: Korean |
