Abstract
Extensive forest fires occurred across the border in Russia. particularly east of Lake Baikal between the Amur and Lena rivers in May 2003. These forest fires released large amounts of particulates and gases into the atmosphere. resulting in adverse effects on regional air quality and the global radiation budget. Smoke pollution from the Russian fires near Lake Baikal was sometimes transported to Korea through Mongolia and eastern China. In this study ground based radiation (visible and UV-B) data measured during May 2003 at Seoul and Kwangju were analyzed to estimate smoke aerosol impacts on solar radiation. Surface criteria air pollutants ($PM_{10}$, CO, $O_3$) data were also obtained from National Institute of Environmental Research (NIER) during smoke aerosol event period (19 May~24 May 2003). Large Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) 1.0~3.0 was observed during this period due to the influence of the long range transport of smoke aerosol plume from the Russian fires, resulting in short-wavelength direct aerosol radiative forcing of -90~ -200W/$m^2$. These smoke aerosol plume caused decrease in surface UV-B radiation up to 80% and increase in PM_(10) concentration up to 200${\mu}g/m^3$ exceeding the 24 hour ambient air quality standard.
