Lee orders faster environmental reviews for 3 mega-projects, drawing concern

President Lee Jae Myung's call Monday for faster environmental impact assessments for three major national mega-projects — including semiconductor complexes that consume vast amounts of water and electricity — has drawn concern from critics who warn the push for speed could undermine environmental protections.

The semiconductor industry is a heavy consumer of water and electricity and a significant emitter of greenhouse gases and pollutants. Critics say accelerating reviews could strip away the very process designed to assess and reduce those harms.

Speaking at a public-private joint inspection meeting on mega-projects at Cheong Wa Dae on Monday, Lee said delays in administrative procedures that slow investment must not be allowed. "Environmental impact assessments are necessary, but if it is the same region, it is important to draw on existing assessment results, and even when a new assessment is required, the timeline needs to be drastically shortened," he said.

The remarks amounted to a directive to speed up environmental impact assessments — the process by which developers evaluate a project's environmental effects and devise measures to minimize them.

Lee also pointed to the SK hynix semiconductor fab in the Yongin general industrial complex in Gyeonggi Province, noting that six years passed between the site being confirmed and construction breaking ground.

He said six years "could be considered fast in its own way, but by my standards it does not seem that fast."

Under the environmental impact assessment system, developers evaluate a project's effects on the environment, draw up mitigation plans and consult with authorities, who must approve the assessment before work can proceed. With an approval rate exceeding 90 percent, the system draws both skeptics who call it ineffective and defenders who say the consultation process meaningfully shapes project plans.

The environmental impact assessment process did play a role in the development of the Yongin semiconductor cluster general industrial complex.

The Han River Basin Environmental Office under the Ministry of Environment — now the Ministry of Climate, Environment and Energy — rejected the draft environmental impact assessment submitted in December 2019 by Yongin city and Yongin General Industrial Complex Co., which were overseeing the complex's development.

Under the project plan at the time, about 370,000 tons of the roughly 610,000 tons of wastewater generated daily by the semiconductor cluster were to be discharged into the Hancheon stream flowing toward Anseong. The rejection cited insufficient consultation with Anseong residents.

Yongin city revised the plan, significantly raising the water quality standards for the discharged wastewater, and signed a cooperative agreement with Anseong, Gyeonggi Province and SK hynix.

The city ultimately secured approval for the environmental impact assessment, subject to conditions including management of the discharged water and monitoring of Gosam Reservoir, into which the discharge flows.

In the case of the Yongin semiconductor national industrial complex, a climate change impact assessment raised concerns that greenhouse gas emissions had been underestimated.

Climate and environmental groups filed a lawsuit arguing that the climate change impact assessment for the Yongin semiconductor national industrial complex had calculated greenhouse gas emissions only for the 3 gigawatts of the complex's 10-gigawatt power requirement to be supplied by a liquefied natural gas power plant, leaving the rest unaccounted for.

The suit was dismissed, but the court found that the climate change impact assessment had "some shortcomings," and the case succeeded in drawing attention to the issue of greenhouse gas emissions from semiconductor industrial complexes.

The semiconductor industry's enormous resource consumption translates into a significant environmental footprint.

Some analyses estimate that producing a single 8-inch wafer requires about 3 tons of water and roughly 360 kilowatt-hours of electricity.

Greenhouse gas emissions are also substantial. According to Samsung Electronics' business report, the company's energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions reached 337,942 terajoules and 18.265 million tons of CO2 equivalent in 2025, up from 301,635 terajoules and 17.338 million tons in 2023.

SK hynix reported energy consumption of 98,103 terajoules and greenhouse gas emissions of 4.995 million tons in 2025, also up from 94,552 terajoules and 4.784 million tons in 2023.

The semiconductor industry has called on the government to ensure a stable power supply through nuclear power plants and LNG combined heat and power plants.

Jeon Young-hyun, vice chairman and chief executive of Samsung Electronics and head of its DS (Semiconductor and Device Solutions) division, called on the government at a national briefing on the southwestern advanced industry belt's development vision on June 30 to expand nuclear power, pursue power purchase agreements and push forward with LNG combined heat and power generation to secure a stable electricity supply.

The problem is that nuclear power produces radioactive waste, while LNG generation emits methane and other greenhouse gases.

Yet Lee's remarks at Monday's meeting — noting that companies worry about baseload power even as renewable energy expands, and urging the government to "proactively resolve even those concerns" — suggest such issues could be pushed aside.

The risk is compounded by last year's launch of the Ministry of Climate, Environment and Energy, which merged under one roof the ministry responsible for supplying energy to semiconductor complexes and the one overseeing environmental impact assessments. With the head of state pressing for speed, environmental considerations are likely to be treated as secondary.

AI data centers, another of the mega-projects, also carry a heavy environmental burden. They consume enormous amounts of electricity to run servers and require vast quantities of cooling water to manage heat — factors that have led residents in the United States and elsewhere to oppose data center projects, in some cases halting them entirely. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, used to cool data center equipment have also been flagged as a concern.

According to Data Center Watch, a US research firm, 75 data center projects in the United States were delayed or halted in the first quarter of this year alone due to local opposition.