• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.78-85
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• 2009

In this study, the hazard rate of the indoor environment of Children's Educational Facilities in Seoul was conducted, in order to determine how the indoor environments of these facilities, where infants and children spend the most time of their away from home day, can effect their health. The way of measurement and analysis were done according to the Indoor Air Quality Standard Method, and the Risk Assessment was accomplished with several significant ways - Hazard Identification, Exposure Assessment, Dose-response Assessment, Risk Characterization, which are deighed by National Research Council (NRC). On each exposure factors, documentary and questionary research such as Epidemiological study and Toxicological study were conducted. The result of the CTE (Central tendency exposure) of Formaldehyde and Benzene by Monte-Carlo simulation was $6.79{\times}10^{-6}$, $2.50{\times}10^{-7}$ which in the case of Formaldehyde exceeded the permitted standard ($10^{-6}$) of the US EPA. The RME(Reasonable maximum exposure) was $7.31{\times}10^{-5}$, $2.65{\times}10^{-6}$ which did not exceed $10^{-4}$, the maximum permitted standards in the US EPA.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.19 no.1 s.19
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• pp.65-75
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• 1986

In order to assess the general health effect due to air pollution and to determine the critical pollutant which is meant by the worst effect to health among various pollutants in Seoul, air quality measurements at 10 sites during $1983{\sim}1984$ were analyzed using Pollutant Standards Index(PSI) : This index has been ultimately proposed to describe the comprehensive degree of the air pollution by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency(EPA) since 1976. Total average of PSI in Seoul during the two years was 139 that is described in 'unhealthful' The highest PSI appeared in Winter 183 through the 2 years, the lowest in Summer 99, and Spring 129 and Fall 150 respectively, PSI in Deungchon dong and Seongsu dong which are industrial areas were very high in terms of 'very unhealthful', while shinlim dong was shown in low in terms of 'good'. TSP was a priority pollutant in Seoul as the most frequently occuring critical pollutant. Its frequency was 76.4% in Spring, 86.0% in Summer, 78.0% in Fall and 44.2% in Winter during the 2 years. In Winter, $TSP{\times}SO_2$ was an important term as the critical pollutant in Seoul. Oxidant was the most frequently occuring critical pollutant in Kwangwhamoon through the whole seasons. It was recommended that the PSI could be used to assess the air pollution administratively and legally in context with publich health.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.353-368
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• 2013

All Koreans had suffered heavily from municipal and industrial air pollution problems since 1960's to 1980's. However the levels of $SO_2$, CO, and Pb have been dramatically decreased since 1990's due to various air pollutants' reduction policies under the provisions of the 1978 Environmental Preservation Act and the 1990 Air Quality Preservation Act such as increasing the supply of low-sulfur fuel, the use of cleaner fuel, no use of solid fuel, and so on. Even though the national ambient air quality standard has been strengthened to protect public health and welfare, the levels of $NO_2$, $O_3$, and $PM_{10}$ frequently exceed the corresponding standards; for example, only 4 stations (1.7%) out of 239 nationwide monitoring stations satisfied the 24-hr based PM10 standard in 2011. Moreover, upto the present time, since there are serious underlying policies of economism and growth-first which can not be solely solved by the environmental laws, it is difficult to root out undesirable social evils such as public indifference, passive academic activities, complacent government bureaucracy, insufficient social responsibility of enterprise, and radical activities of environmental groups. The paper initially reviewed air pollution history of Korea with surveying various environmental factors affecting in/out-door air pollution in the past Korea. Further this study extensively investigated legal and political changes on air pollution control and management for the last 50 years, and then intensively discussed the present environment-related laws and policies unreasonably enforced in Korea. It is necessary to practically revise many outdated legal policies based on health-oriented thinking and on our current economic levels as well.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.779-786
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• 2008

This study was performed to evaluate the characteristics of current air quality and to examine the monthly and yearly variation of $SO_2,\;O_3,\;CO,\;NO_2$, and fine particulate matter(PM-10) concentration in Seosan for the period of 1998-2006. During the recent 3 years, from 2004 to 2006, the yearly mean concentration of $SO_2,\;NO_2$, and PM-10 remained stability but CO and $O_3$ are gradually decreased. The monthly mean concentration of $NO_2$, CO, and $SO_2$ were high in the winter season and decreased steadily to the summer season, but the maximum concentration of $O_3$ and PM-10 appeared in the springtime. The number of days exceeding 24-hour standards for PM-10 were 54 times at Dokgodri and 25 times at Dongmundong. The number of sampling days exceeding the 1-hour and 8-hour standards for $O_3$ were 68 and 210 times at Dongmundong and at Dokgotri 93 and 213 times, respectively.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.574-589
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• 2006

Although concentrations of hazardous air pollutants(HAPs) are very low in the atmosphere, a growing attention has been paid on such compounds due to their high toxicity and bioaccumulation potentials into human body. In order to control and manage the amount of these materials in ambient air, it is necessary to construct monitoring system of them and to know the current concentration level of HAPs above all. In this work, a wide range of HAPs has been measured in metropolitan area to recognize the present state of HAPs in this area. The measured concentration of VOCs was higher in order of Jeonnongdong, Jeongdong, and Yangsuri. The regional difference of VOCs concentration was also highest in spring. Its total VOCs was ranged from $15.17{\sim}41.45$ ppb. Benzene $0.43{\sim}2.32$ ppb showed similar concentration level with the result of previous researches in Seoul. This value is a little higher than the average concentration 0.92 ppb for national ambient air quality standards in Japan. The concentration of aldehydes in this study was lower than those of other researches. Previous works in Seoul metropolitan area showed that the concentration of formaldehyde and acetaldehyde were higher than 5 ppb. The concentration of gaseous and particulate PAHs was high in order of winter, spring, and summer More than 90% of PAHs with low molecular weight such as 2-rings and 3-rings PAHs existed in gas phase. On the other hands, PAHs with high molecular weight more than 5-rings PAHs almost existed in particulate. In spring, the concentration of gaseous PAHs was 24.38 $ng/m^3$ in Jeongdong. Among the particulate PAHs, the concentrations of Naphthalene, Benzo(b)fluoranthene, and Benzo(g, h, i)perylene were higher than others. Especially, the concentration of Benzo(a)pyrene, a important carcinogenic pollutant, was highest in winter 0.5 $ng/m^3$ and ranged from 0.03 to 0.3 $ng/m^3$ in spring and summer, which is lower than the monitoring result in 90's. These components were mainly originated from the vehicle exhaust or heating equipment use.

• Fire Science and Engineering
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.140-151
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• 2019

It is to assess the indoor air quality of the chemical hazardous materials exposed to the fire after firefighters returned to the fire scene. The research subject randomly selected four fire stations located in Seoul, Korea. Two fire stations were set up as control groups after the return of the firefighting activities at the actual fire scene, and two other fire stations were set up as control groups to measure the air quality of the room at normal levels regardless of the action. We conducted 24-hour monitoring for all fire accidents that occurred in Seoul Metropolitan using fire safety map computer system. Also, indoor air quality was measured immediately after homecoming if the experiment group was to be dispatched due to an accident of intermediate or larger scale. 11 hazardous substance items such as fine dust, formaldehyde, volatile organic compounds, PAH, VCM, acidity, asbestos, CO₂, NO₂, O₃ were measured according to the process test method. Three of 11 types of harmful substances exceeded domestic and foreign standards, and one of them was found to be close to foreign standards. In particular, total volatile organic compounds, carbon dioxide and sulfuric acids were 2.5 times, 2.2 times and 1.1 times higher than the standard. Also, for formaldehyde and sulfuric acid, it was measured higher in the control group than in the case group. This findings could be used in policies to improve indoor air quality in the fire station of the Seoul Metropolitan Government.

• Land and Housing Review
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.231-237
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• 2015

Recently, It has been much interest in modular housing construction. so, The purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics of the indoor air quality in modular mock-up housing. We measured indoor air quality(formaldehyde, benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylene, styrene) of two modular mock-up units that built-in furniture is installed and uninstalled. As a result, the pollutants of built-in furniture installed unit were emitted more than built-in furniture uninstalled unit. But after bake-out and ventilation, emission concentrations of two modular mock-up units were similar and were below Indoor Air Quality recommendation standards. Built-in furniture is likely to affect the emission concentration of toluene

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Rural Architecture
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.65-72
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• 2024

In order to analyze the impact of fine dust generated from a construction waste intermediate processing site on the surrounding areas, diverse types of samples were collected from inside the site and surrounding areas. The impact analysis results of samples are as follows. (1) Compared to the air quality management standards by the Ministry of Environment, the concentration of fine dust within the site was 30 to 46% for PM10 and 14 to 42% for PM2.5, which was not much different from the general air quality level. (2) It was found that PM10 within the site may have a partial effect on the air quality, but when the blocking facilities in the site, wheel washing facilities at vehicle entry and exit route, and sprinkler during working were maintained, the impact on the nearby area was not high. (3) In the case of PM2.5, its concentration was influenced more by the exhaust fumes from work vehicles than fine dust generated during construction waste processing. Since the PM2.5 concentrations in the site and surrounding area were not much different from the general air quality, there was little correlation with the work impact of construction waste intermediate processing sites. (4) Pb, an indicator of heavy metal components, was within 50ng/m³ in all three sites, which was 10% of the domestic management standard and equivalent to the general air quality level. The complaints from residents in nearby areas were filed using indicators based on visual and experiential information in their daily lives, so even if the survey results of environmental impact by the construction intermediate waste processing site are lower than the standard, nearby residents can feel it better than such numerical information. Therefore, specific activities to reduce find dusts should be continuously continued.

• Advances in environmental research
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.143-153
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• 2015

The ventilation system is a key device to ensure both healthful indoor air quality (IAQ) and thermal comfort in buildings. The ventilation system should make the IAQ meet the standards such as ASHRAE 62. This study deals with a new approach to modeling the ventilation and IAQ requirement in residential buildings. In that approach, Elite software is used to calculate the air supply volume, and CONTAM model as a multi-zone and contaminant dispersal model is employed to estimate the contaminants' concentrations. Amongst various contaminants existing in the residential buildings, two main contaminates of carbon dioxide ($CO_2$) and carbon monoxide (CO) were considered. CO and $CO_2$ are generated mainly from combustion sources such as gas cooking and heating oven. In addition to the mentioned sources, $CO_2$ is generated from occupants' respirations. To show how that approach works, a sample house with the area of $80m^2$ located in Tehran was considered as an illustrative case study. The results showed that $CO_2$ concentration in the winter was higher than the acceptable level. Therefore, the air change rate (ACH) of 4.2 was required to lower the $CO_2$ concentration below the air quality threshold in the living room, and in the bedrooms, the rate of ventilation volume should be 11.2 ACH.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.54-67
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• 2006

This study was performed to deduct the extension possibility of the standards establishment for $NO_2$, $O_3$, Asbestos, Radon, total volatile organic compounds (TVOC) excluded in the indoor air part of Industrial Safety Acts in Korea. The air pollutants were sampled for 30 office buildings from August to September, 2005 in the metropolitan area. The airborne concentrations of $NO_2$, $O_3$, Radon and TVOC were 0.0092 ppm, 0.0035 ppm, 0.57 pCi/L and $423{\mu}g/m^3$, respectively. The management plan and reduction methods is required in the aspect of indoor air quality(IAQ) because the emission sources of those also exist in indoor as well as outdoor even though those were not exceeded the standards of the Ministry of Environment in Korea. The standard for TVOC in the new and remodeling office has to be established based on the risk assessment when hazard index exceeded "1" in the worst case scenario. In the state of art, the management of each volatile organic compounds has a difficulty due to not enough data for toxicological reference. Therefore, it is suggested that first of all, the standard for TVOC be established and then expanded to each materials for decision-making of improvement of IAQ in office.