South Korea’s leading chemical firm LG Chem has joined hands with the nation’s e-commerce giant Coupang to recycle 3,000 metric tons of plastic packaging waste and to offer a door-to-door plastic-waste retrieval system. At Coupang’s headquarters in Jamsil, southeastern Seoul, LG Chem Executive Vice President Hur Sung-woo and Coupang Vice President Ryan Brown signed an agreement to collect and recycle 3,000 tons of stretch wrap being thrown away at Coupang fulfillment centers e

Hanwha Aerospace became the first South Korean space company to win government approval to utilize resources in space, such as on the moon and Mars, the company said Thursday. According to the defense business unit of Hanwha Group, the firm signed an in-situ resource utilization, or ISRU, agreement with six government-funded research bodies. ISRU refers to using local materials in space and producing necessary items required for space exploration on site, such as water, oxygen, solar cells

Leaders of major South Korean conglomerates including Hyundai Motor and SK officially launched the Korea H2 Business Summit on Wednesday to coordinate their efforts in bringing forth a hydrogen society. A local equivalent of the global CEO-led initiative Hydrogen Council, the coalition launched with 15 founding members, holding its inaugural meeting at Kintex in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province. Hyundai Motor Group Chairman Chung Euisun, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won and Posco Group Chairman Choi Je

Hyundai Motor Group on Tuesday unveiled a new hydrogen vision that includes plans to make hydrogen vehicles as cheap as electric vehicles within 10 years. During “Hydrogen Wave,” the automaker’s first global hydrogen event, Hyundai Motor Group Chairman Chung Euisun laid out his 20-year vision for hydrogen fuel cells and hydrogen mobility. “Hyundai Motor envisions a future society where hydrogen energy is available for everyone, everything and everywhere. I have no d

Korea Aerospace Industries said Tuesday it had acquired a 20 percent stake in Meissa, a South Korean satellite footage analysis firm, to make a foray into the global space services market estimated to be valued at 300 trillion won ($255.4 billion). Together with Meissa, which developed the nation’s first “reconstruction engine” that can convert a 2D footage into 3D, KAI aims to provide advanced satellite footage analysis services using artificial intelligence and big data inst

Amid growing gamer fatigue over extreme pay-to-win games, a South Korean developer has come up with a new mobile game that offers just the opposite: Users can make money simply by enjoying the game. Wemade’s Mir 4 is a 3D massively multiplayer online role-playing game that carries on the previous success of the firm’s The Legend of Mir 2, which recorded 500 million global users. After its global launch in some 170 countries on Aug. 26, it ranked as the fourth-most-played MMORPG on

Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum visited Samsung Biologics’ headquarters in Incheon on Friday but remained silent on how many doses of the Moderna coronavirus vaccine the company would make available for use in South Korea. During his visit Kim checked Samsung Biologics’ facility, where hundreds of millions of doses of the Moderna vaccine will be manufactured starting this month. Despite being produced here, the vaccine is destined for overseas markets. But as Moderna struggles to fulfi

South Korea will take a new approach to trade on five core sectors in a bid to maximize its national interests, the country’s trade minister said Thursday. Presiding over his first trade committee meeting at the government complex in Sejong, newly appointed chief negotiator Yeo Han-koo called for a differentiated, creative and vigilant trade strategy on supply chain, vaccine, carbon neutrality and climate change, technology-based trade and digital commerce. “Korea will take ini

LG Chem said Thursday it will establish South Korea’s first hydrogen-treated vegetable oil factory to bolster its green product portfolio. The HVO factory will be built at the Daesan petrochemicals complex in South Chungcheong Province by 2024, according to the nation’s leading chemical firm. LG Chem will first form a joint venture with Dansuk Industrial, a local chemicals company, to build the factory together. HVO is a diesel substitute made from vegetable oil or waste cookin

INCHEON -- Dust flew through the air as three yellow forklifts busily scooped up a huge chunk of torn wallpaper, green plastic safety nets and steel rebar from a mountain of construction waste. The ground was covered in mud as sprinklers misted the area to suppress the dust. Obviously wearing white shoes was a mistake. On Aug. 26, The Korea Herald visited an automatic construction waste recycling facility located in Incheon.  Sa Gong-myeong, a director at Yido, a South Korean waste man

SK E&S, a natural gas provider under SK Group, said Wednesday that renewables and batteries have limits in fighting climate change and suggested carbon-neutral liquefied natural gas and blue hydrogen as answers. During a press conference held at the Four Seasons Hotel Seoul, CEO Choo Hyung-wook said the firm will ramp up production of carbon-neutral LNG to 1.3 million tons and blue hydrogen to 250,000 tons by 2025 to rise as the No. 1 hydrogen player in the world and achieve a market cap of

Doosan Corp. said Wednesday it has developed the industry’s most efficient solid oxide fuel cell for homes and buildings, with plans to offer the new product to the market next year. According to the holding firm of Doosan Group, the 10-kilowatt SOFCs can turn hydrogen into electricity 40 percent more efficiently than polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells now available in the market. Also, the 10-kW SOFCs exhibit the same efficiency as 5-kW SOFCs, but require 50 percent less space to

South Korea’s newly appointed Trade Minister Yeo Han-koo on Wednesday exchanged ideas with World Trade Organization Director General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on how to restore multilateralism in global trade amid intensifying protectionism triggered by the pandemic. According to the Trade Ministry, during the virtual meeting, which was arranged at the request of the WTO, Yeo stressed that the upcoming 12th Ministerial Conference at the WTO set for Nov. 30 would be a chance to yield tangible r

Netmarble on Tuesday announced the launch of Metaverse Entertainment to explore business opportunities with virtual idols. According to South Korean game company, the new entity is wholly owned by Netmarble F&C, Netmarble’s development arm. F&C co-head Seo Woo-won will double as the inaugural CEO of the entertainment unit. Metaverse Entertainment will develop a virtual reality platform and offer game-related metaverse content, such as managing virtual idols, on it. Netmar