• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.33-44
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• 2020

Recently, a variety of modeling studies have been conducted to examine the air quality over South Korea during the Korea - United States Air Quality (KORUS-AQ) campaign period (May 1 to June 10, 2016). This study investigates the impact of different meteorological initializations on atmospheric modeling results. We conduct several simulations during the KORUS-AQ period using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model with two different initial datasets, which is FNL of NCEP and ERA5 of ECMWF. Comparing the raw initial data, ERA5 showed better accuracy in the temperature, wind speed, and mixing ratio fields than those of NCEP-FNL. On the other hand, the results of WRF simulations with ERA5 showed better accuracy in the simulated temperature and mixing ratio than those with FNL, except for wind speed. Comparing the nudging efficiency of temperature and wind speed fields, the grid nudging effect on the FNL simulation was larger than that on the ERA5 simulation, but the results of mixing ratio field was the opposite. Overall, WRF simulation with ERA5 data showed a better performance for temperature and mixing ratio simulations than that with FNL data. For wind speed simulation, however, WRF simulation with FNL data indicated more accurate results compared to that with ERA5 data.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.19-30
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• 2017

The altitudinal potential source contribution function (PSCFa) method was developed by considering topography and height of back trajectories. The PSCFa calculated on the contributions of trans-boundary transport to the hourly mean concentrations of aerosol optical depth (AOD) of the Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) in the Distributed Regional Aerosol Gridded Observation Networks (DRAGON) KORea-US Air Quality (KORUS-AQ) campaign from March 31 to July 1 in 2016. Eastern China ($33^{\circ}N{\sim}35^{\circ}N$ and $119^{\circ}E{\sim}121^{\circ}E$) can be the major source of trans-boundary pollution to the western area in South Korea resulted from PSCFa (0~700 m). In this study, AOD by Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) was compared to verify the source regions. Regionally, the effects of the long-range transport of pollutants from the eastern China on air quality in south Korea have become more significant over this period.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.472-481
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• 2015

Black carbon (BC) aerosols were monitored at the KIST site ($37.603^{\circ}N$, $127.046^{\circ}E$) and Cheonan-KOREATECH site ($36.766^{\circ}N$, $127.281^{\circ}E$) during the pre KORea-US Air Quality Study (KORUS-AQ) campaign using a couple of Muliti Angle Absorption Photometers (MAAP). BC mass concentrations were presented as $2.14{\pm}1.06{\mu}g/m^3$ and $0.94{\pm}0.60{\mu}g/m^3$ at KIST site (Seoul) and KOREATECH site (Cheonan), respectively. BC mass concentrations measured at KIST and KOREATECH sites from 22:00 on May 22 to 12:00 on May 23, 2015 showed 80% and 72% higher than average BC mass concentrations measured during campaign period, respectively. It indicates both sites could be influenced by a remote source. Similar patterns of BC concentrations between two sites from 20:00 to 24:00 on June 6, 2015 implies that the BC could be transported into both sites and then be stagnant inside the Korean Peninsula. Diurnal variation of BC in weekdays and weekends were also presented for the KIST and KOREATECH sites. Morning rush hour peak was observed at KIST site located in metropolitan area though no distinct morning rush hour peak was not observed at KOREATECH site located in a suburban area. This study revealed transport pathways of BC near the Korean Peninsula using back-trajectory analysis of BC measured both in a metropolitan area and in a suburban area.

• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Sciences Society Conference
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• 2020.10a
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• pp.45-45
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• 2020

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.205-216
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• 2017

Carbonaceous aerosols such as the equivalent black carbon (eBC), the elemental carbon (EC) and the organic carbon (OC) were monitored at the Seoul Olympic Park site ($37.521^{\circ}N$, $127.124^{\circ}E$) during the KORUS-AQ 2016 campaign using a Multi Angle Absorption Photometer (MAAP) and an OCEC Analyzer. Averaged mass concentrations of eBC, EC and OC were presented as $2.46{\pm}1.52{\mu}g/m^3$, $1.01{\pm}0.60{\mu}g/m^3$ and $4.85{\pm}2.60{\mu}g/m^3$, respectively. OC/EC ratio and mass absorption cross-section (MAC) of light absorbing aerosols were calculated as 2.32 and $14.8m^2/g$, respectively. Diesel OC concentrations were estimated from a source profile of diesel vehicles as well. eBC mass concentrations measured from May $26^{th}$ to May $27^{th}$, 2016 showed 40% higher than averaged eBC mass concentrations during campaign period. $PM_{2.5}$ concentrations measured in this period were also higher than average $PM_{2.5}$ concentrations. High eBC concentrations were observed from May $29^{th}$ to May $31^{st}$, 2016 and from June $9^{th}$ to June $11^{th}$, 2016, possibly due to morning rush hour and the effect of temperature inversion at night. Diurnal variations of eBC, EC and Diesel OC showed a typical pattern of metropolitan area. In the weekend, however, diurnal variations of eBC, EC and Diesel OC mass concentrations were different from those measured in the weekday. It is expected that this study can help to understand the relationship between carbonaceous aerosols in a metropolitan area.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.30 no.5
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• pp.413-424
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• 2021

In this study, we quantitatively analyze the effect of ocean emission sources on the simulated O₃ concentrations in South Korea using the community multi-scale air quality (CMAQ) model. To analyze changes in O₃ concentrations by ocean emissions, two different CMAQ simulations considering ocean emissions (OE case) and without considering ocean emissions (NE case) were conducted during the Korea-United States air quality (KORUS-AQ) campaign period (May-June 2016). The changes in the simulated O₃ concentrations due to the effect of ocean emissions (OE case-NE case) appeared mostly in the ocean areas (+1.201 ppbv). The effect of ocean emissions was positive during the daytime (+1.813 ppbv), but negative during the nighttime (-0.612 ppbv). Analysis using the integrated process rate (IPR) confirmed that the increase or decrease in O₃ concentration by ocean emissions was mainly due to chemical processes. Further analysis using the integrated reaction rate (IRR) showed that the daytime increase in O₃ concentration was mainly attributable to the increased O₃ production via O + O₂ + M → O₃ + M reaction as photolysis of NO₂ increased due to the added ocean emissions. The nighttime decrease in O₃ concentration was mainly due to the increased O₃ titration by NO (NO + O₃ → O₂ + NO₂) due to the increased NO emission. These results indicate that the changes in the concentration O₃ in the sea area by the effect of ocean emissions are mainly due to increased NO_x emissions. However, there could be a number of uncertainties in ocean emissions data used in this study, thus continuous comparative research using the most updated data will need to be carried out in the future.

• Atmosphere
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.429-438
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• 2019

Organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC) in PM_2.5 were measured with Sunset Laboratory Model-5 Semi-Continuous OC/EC Field Analyzer by NIOSH/TOT method at Anmyeondo Global Atmosphere Watch (GAW) Regional Station (37°32'N, 127°19'E) in July and August, 2017. The mean values of OC and EC were 3.7 ㎍ m^-3 and 0.7 ㎍ m^-3, respectively. During the study period, the concentrations of reactive gases and aerosol compositions were evidently lower than those of other seasons. It is mostly due to meteorological setting of the northeast Asia, where the influence of continental outflow is at its minimum during this season under southwesterly wind. While the diurnal variation of OC and EC were not clear, the concentrations of O₃, CO, NOx, EC, and OC were evidently enhanced under easterly wind at night from 20:00 to 8:00. However, the high concentration of EC was observed concurrently with CO and NOx under northerly wind during 20:00~24:00. It indicates the influence of thermal power plant and industrial facilities, which was recognized as a major emission source during KORUS-AQ campaign. The diurnal variations of pollutants clearly showed the influence of land-sea breeze, in which OC showed good correlation between EC and O₃ in seabreeze. It is estimated to be the recirculation of pollutants in land-sea breeze cycle. This study suggests that in general, Anmyeondo station serves well as a background monitoring station. However, the variation in meteorological condition is so dynamic that it is primary factor to determine the concentrations of secondary species as well as primary pollutants at Anmyeondo station.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.33 no.6_1
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• pp.961-970
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• 2017

Despite of large demand for high spatial resolution products of aerosol properties from satellite remote sensing, it has been very difficult due to the weak signal by a single pixel and higher noise from clouds. In this study, aerosol retrieval algorithm with the high spatial resolution ($500m{\times}500m$) was developed using Geostationary Ocean Color Imager (GOCI) data during the Korea-US Air Quality (KORUS-AQ) period in May-June, 2016.Currently, conventional GOCI Yonsei aerosol retrieval(YAER) algorithm provides $6km{\times}6km$ spatial resolution product. The algorithm was tested for its best possible resolution of 500 m product based on GOCI YAER version 2 algorithm. With the new additional cloud masking, aerosol optical depth (AOD) is retrieved using the inversion method, aerosol model, and lookup table as in the GOCI YAER algorithm. In some cases, 500 m AOD shows consistent horizontal distribution and magnitude of AOD compared to the 6 km AOD. However, the 500 m AOD has more retrieved pixels than 6 km AOD because of its higher spatial resolution. As a result, the 500 m AOD exists around small clouds and shows finer features of AOD. To validate the accuracy of 500 m AOD, we used dataset from ground-based Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) sunphotometer over Korea. Even with the spatial resolution of 500 m, 500 m AOD shows the correlation coefficient of 0.76 against AERONET, and the ratio within Expected Error (EE) of 51.1%, which are comparable to the results of 6 km AOD.