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A Study on Energy Use, Transport and Settlement Patterns
자원절약적 국토발전방안 연구
: 국토․도시공간구조와 교통에너지 소비와의 관계를 중심으로(RR 2003-4) Sun-Hee Kim, Il-Ho Chung, Seong-Soo Kim, and Jin-Kyu Chung
December 2003․302 pages․Korean
The purpose of the study is to analyze alternatives of national and urban spatial structure for transport energy saving and to suggest strategies for policy implication.
First, previous studies are reviewed to find the relationship between spatial structure and energy consumption. Second, characteristics of the transport energy consumption in the country are summarized. Third, factors affecting transport energy consumption, relationship with environment and telecommunication are analyzed to study ways of energy saving. Finally, energy saving effect of changing spatial structure is analyzed to suggest strategies for energy-saving national development. This study includes seven chapters as followings.
Chapter 1: Introduction
This chapter consists of background, purpose, methodology, and flow of the study.
This study is co-worked by universities and research institutes under the Korea Council of Economic & Social Research Institutes (KCESRI) because it needs professional knowledge from various fields, such as land use, transport, environment, and energy.
Chapter 2: Theories and Previous Studies
This study defines energy-saving national development as strategies of sustainable development at the national and urban spatial levels, and focuses on transportation energy saving. Theories about sustainable development, relationship between transport and energy consumption, compact city, and decentralized concentration are reviewed.
Previous studies show strong relationship between spatial structure and transport energy
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consumption, and suggest importance of changing the national and urban spatial structure for energy saving. It is also suggested that Newman & Kenworthy's study of world cities can be implemented in studies of domestic cities of each country. Those studies would provide logics of necessity for balanced development of the country.
Those studies also argue that transportation and land use should be academically combined to support sustainable development.
Chapter 3: Characteristics of Spatial Structure and Transport Energy Consumption This chapter reviews the relationship among spatial structure changes, generation of travel (trip), and energy consumption. In 2001, transportation energy consumption occupied 22% of the total energy consumption of the country, which has continuously increased. Among that 75% is consumed in the road transportation field. Auto-oriented transportation structure results from the super-mono spatial structure centering on the national capital area. Lack of self sufficiency of the satellite cities and unbalanced job-housing location have increased travel between the central city and suburbs.
Concentration of population and function around the capital area is now one of the main reasons for increasing travel and energy consumption of the country.
Chapter 4: Factors Affecting Transport Energy Consumption
This chapter shows an analysis of the factors affecting transport energy consumption both at the national and urban levels. In addition, effect of telecommunication and logistics changes is analyzed. At the national level, regions where cities are scattered around and population is concentrated in certain cities generate more travels between the cities, and therefore, need more energy consumption. For transport energy saving, self sufficiency of cities should be increased in each region. At the urban level, sizes of population and city area are strongly related with transport energy consumption. In the capital area, average commuting distance is increasing until 25km from the center of Seoul and decreasing from the 25km point. To save transport energy consumption it is recommended that self-sufficiency of the cities within a radius of 30km should be increased and new towns should be developed outside of a 35km radius to reduce
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Chapter 5: Spatial Structure and Transportation Energy saving
This chapter analyzes effects of spatial structure change on transportation energy saving at the national and urban level. From the study at the national level it is found that redistribution of employment in the capital area to other eight metropolitan areas would decrease the total number of trip and save total transportation cost. This study, therefore, recommends a step-by-step approach that redistributes employment of the capital area to the Busan-Ulsan-Gyeongnam metropolitan area first and then to the other areas. Using the Brotchie triangle index with data of the capital region urban-level study finds that population and city size are strongly related with transportation energy consumption. It is also argued that the capital region's dependancy of employment is significant. Decentralized concentration is suggested as an effective spatial structure of the capital region for energy saving.
Chapter 6: Development Strategies for Energy Saving
To change national spatial structure for energy saving three strategies are suggested.
First, population and major functions of the country should be redistributed from the capital region to other metropolitan areas. As mentioned, the step-by-step approach would be effective. Second, compact development of local metropolitan areas would be effective for energy saving. Particularly, middle and small local cities need specialized development linking urban and rural areas. Third, development of self-sufficient middle and small cities on regional transportation nodes is effective for energy saving by increasing accessibility to regional mass transportation systems. To change spatial structure of the national capital region, three strategies are also suggested. First, self-sufficient local center should be developed, especially outside of a 30km radius.
Second, to minimize urban sprawl a new development policy should consider the capacity of urban infrastructure. Third, transportation network centering on Seoul should be resettled including circulation network that minimizes through traffic in the central city.
- 4 - Chapter 7: Conclusion
Findings of the study show that sustainable development of the national territory should be planned and managed in the relationship between land use and transportation. Although this study includes limits, it might be valuable as a comprehensive analysis by reviewing both at the national and urban levels. It would facilitate further researches on energy saving spatial structure and studies on the integration of land use and transportation.
