South Korean interest in DME continues to grow

WWW.BLUEFUELENERGY.COM: Above and beyond the Asian DME Conference held in Seoul in September, two recent news items indicate that South Korean government and private interest in DME/Blue Fuel and its applications continues to grow.

The first story, which appeared in the Korean language Maeil Business Newspaper and was reported by Reuters in their daily press digest on Oct 21, said that the South Korean government is "working on commercialising dimethylether fuel, which is 20-30 percent cheaper than liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), by December, according to the Knowledge Economy Ministry."

The second story, also reported by both Maeil and Reuters, this time on Oct 20, said that "South Korea's state-run Korea Gas Corporation (KOGAS) will invest about 400 billion won ($344.9 million) to build an energy plant in Saudi Arabia, the company said on Wednesday."

Reuters also reported that, "Earlier in the day, the Maeil Business Newspaper cited sources at the economy ministry and KOGAS as saying that the company would sign a preliminary deal with the Saudi Arabian government on Nov. 2 for the plant in Jubail, which would have an annual capacity of 300,000 tonnes of dimethylether (DME) from 2013."