hankyoreh

Sept. 23. (provided by the Committee Against the 765kV Electricity Transmission Towers)

By Choi Sang-won, South Gyeongsang correspondent

Assembly is now complete on sixty-nine 765-kilovolt electricity transmission towers set to go up in the city of Miryang, South Gyeongsang Province. But frictions over the project show no sign of abating, with residents refusing compensation and staging demonstrations against the construction.

The Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO) special policy headquarters for the Miryang construction project announced on Sept. 23 that assembly had been finished for all 69 towers scheduled to be raised in the five Miryang townships of Danjang, Sanoe, Sangdong, Bubuk, and Cheongdo.

KEPCO plans to finish wiring between towers by late November, after which test transmission would begin in early December for electricity produced at the No. 1 and 2 reactors at the Shin-Kori Nuclear Power Plant in Busan. Commercial operation is scheduled to begin by the end of the year.

“All the remaining parts are proceeding safely and will be finished by the end of 2014. We intend to work harder to resolve conflicts in the Miryang area and cooperate fully with its development,” said headquarters chief Baek Jae-hyun.

But the same day saw around 200 local residents who oppose the towers gather at the Miryang City Hall entrance at 11 am for a rally to denounce KEPCO.

“We have never given permission for a single one of those towers built by dirty money and the public authorities,” protestors declared at the rally, adding that they “intend to fight together until the very last tower is pulled from the ground.”

The Committee Against the 765kV Electricity Transmission Towers in Miryang echoed the message in a statement announcing, “We hereby declare that the Miryang battle is not over.”

“We will not waver in our fight until the day KEPCO pays the due price for the violence and harm it has inflicted on residents,” the statement continued.

Since 2008, KEPCO has been carrying out a project to build 756-kV electricity transmission wires from the Shin-Kori plant to the North Gyeongnam Substation. It involves building 161 towers along a 90.5-km stretch of land to send power from the No. 3 and 4 reactors at the plant in Ulsan’s Ulju County to the substation in South Gyeongsang Province’s Changnyeong County.

But the project has run into heavy resistance from residents in the townships of Danjang, Sanoe, Sangdong, and Bubuk, with two villagers taking their own lives in an attempt to block the construction. The conflict has resulted in the completion date being pushed back by around four years from its original schedule.

The battle over the towers shows no sign of slowing down. Funerals have yet to be held for the residents who committed suicide, and recent evidence has surfaced to suggest attempts to buy off local opponents of the project.

The construction of 69 765㎸ electricity transmission towers is complete in the Miryang

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]