• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.193-200
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• 2017

Objectives: This study was performed to evaluate the neurototoxicity of the environmental pollutant lead acetate(LA) and the protective effect of the D-2-amino-5-phosphonovaleric acid(APV), N-methyl-D-aspartate(NMDA) receptor antagonist on LA-induced cytotoxicity in cultured C6 glioma cells. Materials and Methods: For this study, cell viability in cultured C6 glioma cells was assessed by XTT assay and antioxidative effect, such as lactate dehydrogenase(LDH) activity, by LDH detection kit. Results: LA significantly decreased cell viability in a dose-dependent manner, and the XTT50 value was determined to be 33.3 uM of LA. The cytotoxicity of LA was deemed highly toxic according to Borenfreund and Puerner's toxic criteria. The vitamin E antioxidant significantly increased cell viability damaged by LA-induced cytotoxicity in these cultures. For the protective effect of APV on LA-induced cytotoxicity, APV significantly increased not only cell viability, but also inhibition of LDH activity. From these results, it is suggested that oxidative stress is involved in the neurotoxicity of LA, and APV effectively protected against LA-induced cytotoxicity via an antioxidative effect as an inhibotory activity of LDH. Conclusions: Natural resources like APV may be putative therapeutic agents for the toxic diminution of environmental pollutants such as LA correlated with oxidative stress.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.39-47
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• 2010

Annually, the scale of agricultural areas in Korea were being reduced as the lands were converted to other land uses. While the rate of productivity were either being maintained or increased, the pollution load from these areas were still greater in magnitude. Although the levels of pollutant concentration released in the agricultural watersheds were minimal, the combined quantities mostly from diffuse sources were high. As a consequence, the Ministry of Environment (MOE) in Korea adopted the use of free water surface (FWS) flow constructed wetlands to reduce the pollutant loadings emitted from agricultural watersheds for the improvement of water quality and protection of aquatic ecosystems. In this study, a constructed wetland treating stream water in an agricultural watershed was monitored since April 2009 subsequent to its completion in December 2008. Satisfactory performance was achieved for TSS, BOD and TP with 26%, 28% and 39% pollutant removal rates, respectively. In addition, the effluent water quality was improved and achieved compliance the national water quality criteria. Results of this study can be useful to establish design parameters and employ proper removal techniques of similar natural treatment systems for future implementation in the country.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.248-255
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• 2005

Since the water quality of drinking water sources has been recognized as a big issue, the ministry of Environment in Korea is designing the total maximum daily load (TMDL) program for 4 major large rivers. The TMDL program can be successfully performed as controling the nonpoint pollutants from watershed area near the river. Of the various landuses in nonpoint pollution, parking lots and bridges are stormwater intensive landuses because of high imperviousness and high pollutant mass emissions from vehicular activities. Vehicle emissions from those areas include different pollutants such as heavy metals, oil and grease and particulates from sources such as fuels, brake pad and tire wear, etc. Especially the pollutant washed-off from the landuses are directly affecting to the river water quality. Therefore this research was conducted to understand the magnitude and nature of the stormwater emissions with the goal of quantifying stormwater pollutant concentrations and mass emission rates of pollutants from parking lot and bridges in Korea. In Kongju city areas, two monitoring sites were equipped with an automatic rainfall gages and an automatic flow meter for accumulating the useful data such as rainfall, water quality and runoff flow. This manuscripts will show the concentration changes during storm duration and EMCs to characterize the concentration profiles in different land uses. Also the first flush criteria will be suggested using dynamic EMCs. The definition of dynamic EMC is a new approach explaining the relationship of EMC and first flush effect.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.35 no.11
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• pp.785-794
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• 2013

Combined sewer overflows during rainfall events contain sewer sediments and surface pollutants. This can cause significant chemical, physical and biological problems to receiving watershed. However, there are no method that can commonly apply to decide criteria for controlling the pollutant load. In this study, it sets up the reduction goals of combined sewer overflow through long-term simulation using the rainfall-runoff model. From a review of domestic and foreign management standard of combined sewer overflow for this, it makes decision that 60% (phase 1), 85% (phase 2) of total pollutant load and frequency per year for reduction goals is more proper. Also, the result of analyzing long-term simulation (minimum 10 years) applied to research basin indicates that reduction goals of BOD pollutant load are 1,123 kg (phase 1) and 2,374 kg (phase 2), and overflow volumes for research objective achievement are $11,685m^3$ (phase 1) and $24,701m^3$ (phase 2).

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.296-314
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• 2014

In recent years, Ministry of Environment (MOE) has been implementing a phased strengthening of the effluent standards for sewage treatment plants. In this regard, a comprehensive system should be developed to help check the appropriateness of such standards by specifying the grounds for standard-setting and investigating the current operation of sewage treatment plants clearly. It is necessary to establish a new standard-setting system for the effluent that is in a closer connection with the environmental criteria and rating systems. In the United States, the federal government provides guidelines on the least provisions and requirements for the Publicly Owned Treatment Works (POTWs). Local governments set the same or stricter guidelines that reflect the characteristics of each state. In Japan, the sewage treatment plants are subject to both the effluent standards and the discharge acceptable limits to pubic waters under the sewerage law. Specific requirements and limits are set in accordance with local government regulations. The European Union imposes sewage treatment plants with different provisions for effluent standards, depending on the sensitivity of public waters to eutrophication. The effluent standards for sewage treatment plants are classified by pollutant loads discharged to receiving waters. MOE also needs to introduce systems for setting new parameter standards on a POTW effluent by applying statistical means and treatment efficiencies or optimal treatment techniques, as seen in the cases of the US National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) or the EU Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC).

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.18 no.E2
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• pp.97-106
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• 2002

The purpose of this study was to quantitatively estimate the washout removal efficiencies of criteria air pollutants such as SO$_2$, TSP, PM10, CO, NO$_2$, and O$_3$corresponding to the amounts and durations of precipitation. The removal patters by washout were studied with air pollutants data and the corresponding precipitation data in Seoul, Korea during the periods of 1990 to 1999. In addition, washout patterns were classified into four seasons and four time Bones, i.e., night, morning, afternoon, and evening. In this study, natures of air pollutants by sequential precipitation were also intensively studied by examining the linear relationships between removal efficiencies and the amounts and durations of precipitation for each pollutant. The results of this study showed that SO$_2$, TSP, and O$_3$were rapidly removed by initial precipitation; however, NO$_2$was slowly removed 2-hour after precipitation. Both CO and PM10 were weakly removed by washout and their removal patters showed to be irregular.

• Asian Journal of Atmospheric Environment
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.194-201
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• 2017

This study investigates the factors that affect China's air pollution using city-level panel data and spatial econometric models. We address three air pollutants ($PM_{10}$, $SO_2$, and $NO_2$) present in 30 cities in China between 2004-2012 using global OLS and spatial models. To develop the spatial econometric analysis, we create a spatial weights matrix to define spatial patterns based on two neighborhood criteria - the queen contiguity and k nearest neighbors. The results show that the estimated coefficients are relatively consistent across different spatial weight criteria. The OLS models indicate that the effect of green spaces is statistically significant in decreasing the concentrations of all air pollutants. In the $PM_{10}$ and $SO_2$ analyses, the OLS models find that the number of buses and population density are also positively related to a reduction in the concentration of air pollutants. In addition, an increase in the temperature and the presence of secondary industries increase $SO_2$ and $NO_2$ concentrations, respectively. All spatial models capture a positive and significant effect of green spaces on reducing the concentration of each air pollutant. Our results suggest that green spaces in cities should receive priority consideration in local planning aimed at sustainable development. Furthermore, policymakers need to be able to discern the differences among pollutants when establishing environmental policies.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.355-362
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• 2002

There has been relatively a few studies that focused on evaluation of uncertainty for standard methods by which criteria pollutants are analyzed in ambient air. Especially, uncertainty evaluation has not been made yet for sampling and analysis of airborne NO$_2$. Ambient NO$_2$ has been thought to be a major criteria pollutant worldwide because of the potential of ozone formation as well as of its own toxicity. In this study, we tried to assess uncertainties associated with the every step of sampling and of analytical procedure of Griess-Saltzman method. Quality assurance (QA) and quality control (QC) were also emphasized with the uncertainty characterization. The use of Griess-Saltzman method for ambient NO$_2$ analysis showed very uniform daily concentration distribution with the mean of 10.8 ppb and the standard deviation of 1.08ppb during the sampling period. However, seven daily samples collected at the same sampling time and place exhibited highly different concentration distribution. Therefore, we evaluated uncertainties associated with sampling and analysis through the precise application of ISO Guide. Estimates of expanded uncertainties for a total of 62 samples fell in a relatively broad range of 5.17% to 11.85%. On the other hand. the expanded uncertainties were smaller for the high concentration range of greater than 15ppb.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.641-646
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• 2004

Vehicle emissions from highway landuse include different pollutants such as heavy metals, oil and grease and particulates from fuels, brake pad wear and tire wear. Since highways are impervious and have high pollutant mass emissions from vehicular activity, it is considered as stormwater intensive landuses. Therefore this research was performed to understand the magnitude of first flush and to suggest the criteria of first flush for storm runoff management in highways. The fractions of washed-off mass are very high in first 30% of runoff volume, which suggests a definition of first flush. The washed-off mass stabilizes after 30% of the runoff volume and it is apparent that treatment capacity in the early part of a storm is more valuable than treatment capacity in the later part of the storm. Using the criteria of "high" first flush and "medium" first flush, as 50% of the mass in the first 30% of the volume, and 30 to 50% in the first 30% volume, respectively, more than 30% of the storms showed high first flush. A "first flush friendly" best management practice(BMP), meaning a BMP that can treat a high percentage or all of the initial flow, would be advantageous up to 80% of the events.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.45-49
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• 2002

To estimate annual pollutant loading rate of n-hexane extractable material (HEM) to soil 84 sewage sludge samples were analyzed. The average content of HEM was 27.7$\pm$26.5 g/kg, and ranged from 1.05 to maximum 194 g/kg. According to the number of population of the city the areas were classified as five regions, i.e. big, large, middle, small, and rural area in which the waste water treated plants were grown. The contents of HEM were 22.7$\pm$16.7, 33.3$\pm$25.8, 22.0$\pm$8.7, 31.0$\pm$38.8, 27.7$\pm$25.1 g/kg, in big, large, middle, small, and rural area, respectively. The applicated areas with sewage sludge to land also were divided as 4 sites by US EPA criteria such as agricultural, forest, public contact sites, and reclamation site. The quantitation of annual pollutant loading rate was estimated using a function (99 percentile concentration = $\bar{X}$ + 3$\sigma$) when the application amounts were in dosages of 7,000, 26,000, 18,000, 74,000 kg/ha in 5 regions, respectively. The annual pollutant loading rate of HEM to soil by sewage sludge application was maximum 1,032, 3,832, 2,653, and 10,908 kg/ha in agricultural, forest, public contact sites, and reclamation site, respectively.