DC Electric & Electronics Industry Development Center Opened in Gwangju Metropolitan City
One-stop service support for testing and commercialization for 54 member companies

The Korea Electronics Technology Institute (KETI) opened the DC Electric & Electronic Industry Development Center in Gwangju Metropolitan City.

The DC Electric & Electronics Industry Development Center, which has been in preparation since 2014, is the only infrastructure in Korea equipped with a one-stop support system for testing and commercialization related to DC electric and electronics, such as electromagnetic and environmental reliability.

Direct current has over 40% less power loss compared to alternating current during transmission, and since it has no frequency, there are no electromagnetic wave issues during transmission. In addition, power can be transmitted by burying power lines underground instead of using transmission towers. However, because AC transformers were developed first, the current power infrastructure is AC-based.

The newly opened DC Electrical & Electronics Center has introduced 17 types of low-voltage direct current (LVDC) related measurement and testing equipment, including a 10m electromagnetic radiation shielding chamber, a gigahertz (GHz) band debugging chamber, an electromagnetic radiation immunity (RS) chamber, and an electromagnetic shielding room, for the first time in the Honam region.

The center plans to continue conducting various electromagnetic and environmental reliability tests for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that find it difficult to purchase expensive R&D equipment, including LVDC power system and battery charge/discharge load simulations, solar inverter testing, lithium-ion/hydrogen battery simulations, voltage fluctuation testing, and harmonic content testing.

KETI President Park Cheong-won stated, “DC electrical and electronic technology is a core infrastructure technology of the Fourth Industrial Revolution that not only saves energy but also facilitates integration with distributed power sources such as solar power and fuel cells,” adding, “We will accelerate the revitalization of the DC electrical and electronic industry to meet the paradigms of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, such as the expansion of renewable energy and the advent of the electric vehicle era, by participating in the commercialization of High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) systems based on DC transmission and distribution in the future.”