The Ministry of Science and ICT announced on May 31 that it will launch a full-fledged demonstration project to support the growth of the digital twin industry with the National Information Society Agency and the National IT Industry Promotion Agency.

Digital twin implements and synchronizes real objects in the same way as twins in a virtual environment, and then uses them for real-world decisions such as control, analysis, and prediction through simulation. It is one of the core technologies that contribute to improving the efficiency and safety of smart cities by being applied to various fields such as manufacturing, safety, and the environment.

The Ministry of Science and ICT will invest a total of 25.95 billion won this year to support three demonstration projects and 15 detailed tasks, including 5G-based digital twin public leadership, intelligent informatization on national infrastructure, and a digital twin-based urban flooding smart response system. It is increased by 6.45 billion won from last year.

First of all, the government plans to continue to select the “Smart Harbor Logistics System” and the “Digital Twin Water Basin Management Platform” project, which showed results last year, as a target for support to supplement and advance functions.

The establishment of the “Smart Harbor Logistics System" project will increase the accuracy of ship entry and departure prediction by expanding the scope of analysis of ship operation data this year. In addition, the utilization of the smart harbor logistics system will be increased through container export simulation.

The 'Digital Twin Water Basin Management Platform' project to intelligently manage water will enable precise simulation results to be derived. In addition, it plans to upgrade its functions by increasing the number of safety analysis targets for vulnerable banks and using them for flood prevention.

In particular, the Ministry of Science and ICT will establish this year's Information Strategy Plan (ISP) reflecting last year's empirical results and spread to the five major rivers nationwide through the Ministry of Environment's project from next year.

Moreover, the government is planning to apply digital twin to wind power generators to support carbon neutrality.

Specifically, by predicting the failure of the wind generator through artificial intelligence learning, it will be proactively maintained and repaired, and the efficiency of wind power generation will be improved by simulating for optimizing power generation.

In addition, it plans to push for a new "simulation SaaS transition" demonstration task to create a foundation for the spread of digital twins based on domestic technology.

SaaS(Software as a service) refers to a method of providing software as a cloud-based service without installing it on a user's PC.

Simulation is a key element of the digital twin to support optimal decision-making through prediction and simulation. This year, it decided to strengthen the technological competitiveness of related companies by selecting simulation technologies for fluid analysis and molecular to support SaaS conversion.

Besides, various tasks including △a demonstration to minimize flooding damage repeated every year(Gwangju Metropolitan City) △establishing an aging underground piping monitoring platform in an industrial complex(Ulsan National Industrial Complex), and △ demonstrating safety management of public facilities such as Busan Jagalchi Market for disaster prevention and safety improvement are also planned.

Park Yoon-kyu, head of the information and communication policy division at the Ministry of Science and ICT, said, "We have expanded the demonstration project to substantially promote the digital twin activation strategy. We will continue to develop core technologies to strengthen the digital twin ecosystem led by the private sector and actively discover and promote demonstration tasks in new fields to strengthen technological competitiveness and support industrial growth.”