September 09, 2024

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Korea Aerospace Research Institute's Optionally Piloted Personal Air Vehicle, or OPPAV (Korea Aerospace Research Institute)

Korea’s private and public sectors have been working relentlessly to commercialize urban air mobility, or UAM, in 2025 as the country looks to take the lead in the up-and-coming global UAM sector.

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport has laid out the K-UAM roadmap with two-part demonstration projects of "Grand Challenges," or GC1 and GC2. The ministry explained that UAM, which mainly focuses on utilizing electric vertical take-off and landing, or eVTOL, aircraft to offer alternative means of transportation, is considered a transportation method that can cover a distance of about 50 kilometers in about 20 minutes while emitting no carbon dioxide as the aircraft is powered by electricity.

The GC1 consists of testing UAM aircraft flights over the open terrain in Goheung, South Jeolla Province. The GC2 takes place in the metropolitan areas of Seoul and Gyeonggi Province. The CG2 demonstration requires a pilot in the UAM aircraft, unlike the CG1 that checks the eVTOL aircraft’s autonomous flying ability.

As of July, there were five consortiums taking part in the government’s K-UAM project. Two of them -- K-UAM One Team consisting of Hyundai Motor Group, Korean Air, KT, Incheon International Airport Corporation and Hyundai Engineering & Construction and Lotte Group consortium made up of Lotte Rental, Lotte Engineering & Construction and Lotte Innovate -- have completed the GC1 part.

K-UAM One Team became the first team to complete the ministry’s overall safety test of the UAM aircraft’s ground transport, take-off, flight and landing in April this year. The test included 10 scenarios such as normal operation, responses to irregularities and management to prevent clashes. Each scenario was repeated three times to certify the safety.

The Lotte consortium also underwent a similar process to complete the GC1 demonstration last month. The remaining three consortiums -- UAMitra made up of small- to mid-sized firms; K-UAM Dream Team consisting of SK Telecom, Hanwha Systems and Korea Airports Corporation; and UAM Future Team including Kakao Mobility, LG Uplus and GS Engineering & Construction -- are scheduled to complete the GC1 demonstration throughout the rest of the year.

A group of reviewers appointed by the Transport Ministry will examine the GC1 demonstrations to determine whether each consortium can advance to the second part of the K-UAM Grand Challenge.

Although the specific timeline could change depending on the assessment of the demonstrations, a Transport Ministry official said the ultimate goal is to commercialize UAM in the country by the end of next year.

According to the transport ministry’s projections, the global UAM market is expected to reach $51.6 billion in 2030, over five times higher than the $10.9 billion forecast for 2025. The projections see an even bigger exponential growth for the UAM sector as the global UAM market is expected to hit $609 billion in 2040.

Experts say that the legal basis for the UAM sector should be laid out early and provide a pathway for the development of UAM technologies, advising that local governments need to work on establishing UAM infrastructures such as vertiports that refer to an area designed for eVTOL aircrafts’ pick-up and drop-off services.

“We could say that setting up integrated regulations is more important than making (UAM) aircraft,” said Kim Pil-su, an automotive engineering professor at Daelim University.

“Whether they are preventive measures or follow-up measures, (UAM) regulations are non-existent right now. So we need to draft them in a similar way with the automotive laws not on the ground but in the air, which is very difficult to do.”

Moon Hak-hoon, an automotive engineering professor at Osan University, said the K-UAM Grand Challenge will be realistically limited to certain areas because there are not enough relevant infrastructures set up across the country.

“A pilot route could be from Jamsil to (the Gimpo) airport,” said Moon. “In order to operate it, there should be a lot of legal backing as it will be the first trial … I think we still have a long way to go as we have to consider how to solve the issue of noise and flight routes, but in a small country like ours, we have many options to utilize UAM for short-distance travel so that could be our advantage.”

Saying that the Transport Ministry’s UAM commercialization target will be very constrained, Lee Ho-geun, an automotive engineering professor at Daeduk Univesity, explained that the initial flights will fly over only the routes that would not damage other transportation.

“A major concern is whether the National Assembly would pass laws required to popularize UAM in time,” said Lee.

“The success of Korea’s UAM sector depends on how far the government and companies will be determined to go because UAM businesses will not see profits until the market becomes vibrant. It will take a lot of time before the UAM sector’s demand reaches a certain level.”

By Kan Hyeong-woo (hwkan@heraldcorp.com)