South Korea is working to increase the number of hydrogen cars in the country to reach about 300,000 vehicles by 2030, and several problems have emerged resulting from the increase in the number of cars that operate on hydrogen fuel cells, the most prominent of which is the lack of a sufficient number of charging stations in South Korea, especially in the past 3 years. .

The Korean Automobile and Mobility Association confirmed that the number of hydrogen charging stations established over the past years has exceeded, and the number of hydrogen cars in South Korea over the past three years has witnessed a significant increase by 22,433 cars. It rose to 34,872 vehicles from 12,439 vehicles, while the number of charging stations increased to 172 from 69.

The month of March witnessed an increase in the number of hydrogen vehicles in South Korea per charging station to 203 from 180 in March 2021, an increase of 12%. A problem arose in the city of Sejong – 113 kilometers south of the capital, Seoul – where the number of hydrogen vehicles at each station rose to 224 from 53, and decreased. The number of hydrogen vehicles per station in Gangwon Province increased to 226 from 484.

The southern government is moving to rely on hydrogen to achieve carbon neutrality during the crisis of land shortages needed to build renewable energy projects, which contributes to achieving carbon neutrality targets. Hydrogen car registrations in Korea reached 4,635 vehicles, including passenger units, trucks, and buses, in 2023.

Electric vehicle registrations witnessed a decline of 54% in 2023, and South Korea aims to convert 2,000 public buses to run on hydrogen by 2026, in addition to increasing the fleet of transportation means and hydrogen trucks to produce 30,000 vehicles powered by liquid hydrogen in the country by 2030.

During the month of November 2022, the government developed a vision for transforming the transportation sector to be a major driver for increasing demand for hydrogen, and there are several questions about the government’s ability to achieve the goals of its plan to launch 300,000 hydrogen cars by the end of this decade, especially with the sharp decline in hydrogen vehicles in Germany, the largest European market. For electric cars, hydrogen car sales in Europe declined by 70% during 2023.