Abstract
After the Fukushima nuclear accident, the external costs of generating electricity from nuclear power plants such as additional safety compliance costs and possible accident risk action costs have gained increasing attention from the public, policy-makers and politicians. Consequently, estimates of the external costs of nuclear power are very deliberate issue that is at the center of the controversy in Korea. In this paper, we try to calculate the external costs associated with the safety of the nuclear power plants, particularly focusing on additional safety compliance costs and possible accident risk action costs. To estimate the possible accident risk action costs, we adopt the damages expectation approach that is very similar way from the external cost calculation of Japanese government after the Fukushima accident. In addition, to estimate additional safety compliance costs, we apply the levelized cost of generation method. Furthermore, we perform the sensitivity analysis to examine how much these social costs increase the electricity price rate. Estimation results of the additional security measure cost is 0.53Won/kWh ~ 0.80Won/kWh depending on the capacity factor, giving little change on the nuclear power generation cost. The estimates of possible accident risk action costs could be in the wide range depending on the different damages of the nuclear power accident, probability of the severe nuclear power accident and the capacity factor. The preliminary results show that it is 0.0025Won/kWh ~ 26.4188Won/kWh. After including those two external costs on the generation cost of a nuclear power plant, increasing rate of electricity price is 0.001%~10.0563% under the capacity factor from 70% to 90%. This paper tries to examine the external costs of nuclear power plants, so as to include it into the generation cost and the electricity price. This paper suggests one of the methodologies that we might internalize the nuclear power generations' external cost, including it into the internal generation cost.
후쿠시마원자력발전소의 사고를 계기로 원전의 안전대책비용, 사고위험대응비용과 같은 외부비용들의 존재가 부각되고 있다. 이에 본 연구는 원전의 외부비용들 중에서 추가안전대책비용과 사고위험대응비용을 추정하고, 이를 발전원가 및 전기요금에 반영하여 변화정도를 살폈다. 원전의 추가안전대책비용은 70~90%의 이용률에서 0.53원/kWh~0.80원/kWh으로 원전의 발전원가에 큰 영향을 미치지는 않는다. 사고위험대응비용은 원전사고피해규모별, 사고발생빈도별, 이용률별로 0.0025원/kWh~26.4188원/kWh로 추정되었다. 사고위험대응비용을 포함시키면 원전발전원가는 47.58원/kWh~85.92원/kWh가 된다. 2011년을 기준으로 사고위험대응비용을 내부화한 경우의 전기요금의 증가율은 70~90%의 이용률에서 0.001%~10.0563% 로 추정되었다. 본 연구는 원전의 외부비용을 내부화하는 방법으로서 외부비용을 발전원가에 포함하여 전기요금에 반영하였다. 본 연구는 지금까지 우리나라에 논의되지 않았던 원전 외부비용을 내부화하는 방법의 하나가 될 것이다.
