• Journal of Climate Change Research
• /
• v.8 no.4
• /
• pp.401-414
• /
• 2017

Vegetation and landscape characteristics at the three highest summits of Republic of Korea, i.e. Seoraksan, Jirisan and Hallasan, are analyzed on the basis of species composition, physiognomy, vegetation distribution and structure of alpine plants, along with landform, geology, soil and habitat conditions. Dominant high mountain plants at three alpine and subalpine belts contain deciduous broadleaved shrub, Rhododendron mucronulatum var. ciliatum (31.6%), and evergreen coniferous small tree, Pinus pumila (26.3%) at Seoraksan, deciduous broadleaved tree, Betula ermanii (35.3%), evergreen coniferous tree, Picea jezoensis (23.5%) at Jirisan, and evergreen coniferous tree, Abies koreana (22.6%), deciduous broadleaved shrub, Rhododendron mucronulatum var. ciliatum, and Juniperus chinensis var. sargentii (19.4%) at Hallasan, respectively. Presence of diverse landscapes at the peak of Seoraksan, such as shrubland, grassland, dry land along with rocky areas, and open land may be the result of hostile local climate and geology. High proportion of grassland and wetland at the top of Jirisan may related to gneiss-based gentle topography and well developed soil deposits, which are beneficial to keep the moisture content high. Occurrence of grassland, shrubland, dry land, conifer vegetation, and rocky area at the summit of Hallasan may due to higher elevation, unique local climate, as well as volcanic origin geology and soil substrates. Presences of diverse boreal plant species with various physiognomy at alpine and subalpine belts, and wide range of landscapes, including rocky, grassland, shrubland, wetland, and conifer woodland, provide decisive clues to understand the natural history of Korea, and can be employed as an relevant environmental indicator of biodiversity and ecosystem stability.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
• /
• v.45 no.5
• /
• pp.711-716
• /
• 2012

Due to the climate change in South Korea the annual total precipitation will increase by 17 percent by 2100. Rainfall is concentrated during the summer in South Korea and the landslide of farmland by heavy rain is expected to increase. Because regional torrential rains accompanied by a storm continue to cause the damage in farmland urgent establishment of adaptation plant for minimizing the damage is in need. In this study we assessed vulnerability of landslide of farmland by heavy rain for local governments. Temporal resolution is 2000 year and the future 2020 year, 2050 year, 2100 year via A1B scenario. Vulnerability of local government were evaluated by three indices such as climate exposure, sensitivity, adaptive capacity and each index is calculated by selected alternative variable. Collected data was normalized and then multiplied by weight value that was elicited in delphi investigation. Current vulnerability is concentrated in Jeju island and Gyeongsangnam-do, however, it is postulated that Kangwon-do will be vulnerable in the future. Through this study, local governments can use the data to establish adaptation plans for farmland landslide by climate change.

• Journal of Climate Change Research
• /
• v.3 no.1
• /
• pp.51-69
• /
• 2012

This work aims to propose a vulnerability assessment methodology of ecosystem at present time, and an to suggest an adaptation strategy of ecosystem in the future for local government, in the fields of plant, animal and conservation area, which would occurred due to climate change. Vulnerability assessment in ecosystem includes first, tree growth and distribution part, mainly for conifers, secondly, insect part for pest and bee, and thirdly conservation area management part, especially at the national parks. To evaluate the degree of vulnerability of each substitute variables, such as exposure of climatic element, sensitivity, and adaptation ability, are respectively selected. Vulnerabilities of conifer growth and distribution, pest and bee, and national park management seem to be strongly influenced by the exposure of climatic element than other factors, such as sensitivity and adaptation ability. With time regional gaps of ecosystem vulnerability are expected to be greater in both conifers growth and distribution, and national park management, but reduced in pest and bee in 2100 in comparison with present time.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
• /
• v.23 no.8
• /
• pp.1469-1480
• /
• 2014

This study, through the survey of citizens of Daegu in regard to the environment education experience and citizens perception, seeks to identify the order of importance and perception on the severity of environment. The survey has found that 36.4% citizens of Daegu have environment education experience. Those who have experience have high standard of living, live in high population density area and where pollutant generating plants are prevalent. In addition they are likely to live in apartment, are younger, and the higher the education level, more opportunities they have in getting environment education. The study has found that the environment education experience gives noticeable influence on environment perception, environment attitude, and environment activities. Also, those who have the environment education are likely to be interested in environment, know green growth policies, and are positive about local environment activities. Thus, they are willing to participate in activities to improve local environment and have emphasized the need for more environment education. As for what environment elements are most severe, they pointed to the "global warming and climate change" and "everyday garbage" and as for what are important, they chose "drinking water quality" and "global warming and climate change." Based on the study, we came to the conclusion that more environment education should be provided to elevate the interest in environment and subsequently, foster the sense of responsibility and civic mind toward the preservation of environment. In light of above, local governments must expand their supports and fully utilize the Local Agenda 21 to promote the education and increase the perception of citizens on the environment.

• Atmosphere
• /
• v.20 no.1
• /
• pp.27-35
• /
• 2010

This study analyzes the climate change in Korea and its impact on the occurrence of forest fire events. The forest fire occurrences in Korea tend to concentrate around large cities. In addition, the spatial distribution of the forest fire occurrence seems to agree with local climate conditions. Though the occurrence of the forest fire shows strong interannual variation, it also exhibits a positive trend. Because the forest fire frequently occurs during early spring, we examined long term climate variability in Korea for the early spring seasons. The climate change in Korea generally has brought warmer, drier, and less precipitable conditions during the early spring. The changes of the atmospheric conditions provide favorable condition for the forest fire. The climate changes in Korea also depict distinct spatial variability according to the atmospheric variables. We compared the regional trend of the fire occurrence with the climate trends. The results show the sharpest growing in the forest fire occurrence over southwest of Korea. This study suggests that the decrease in the precipitation day might affect the sharp increasement of the forest fire occurrence in the southwest of Korea.

• KCID journal
• /
• v.18 no.2
• /
• pp.33-42
• /
• 2011

Climate change has impacts on not only the average temperature rise but also the intensity and frequency of extreme events such as flood and drought. It is also expected that the damages on agricultural infrastructure will be increased resulting from increased rainfall intensity and frequency caused by climate change. To strengthen the climate change adaptation capacity, it is necessary to identify the vulnerability of a given society's physical infrastructures and to develop appropriate adaptation strategies with infrastructure management because generally facilities related to human settlements are vulnerable to climate changes and establishing an adaptive public infrastructure would reduce the damages and the repair cost. Therefore, development of mitigation strategies for agricultural infrastructure against climatic hazard is very important, but there are few studies on agricultural infrastructure vulnerability assessment and adaptation strategies. The concept of vulnerability, however, is difficult to functionally define due to the fact that vulnerability itself includes many aspects (biological, socioeconomic, etc.) in various sectors. As such, much research on vulnerability has used indicators which are useful for standardization and aggregation. In this study, for the vulnerability assessment for agricultural infrastructure, 3 categories of climate exposure, sensitivity, and adaptation capacity were defined which are composed of 16 sub-categories and 49 proxy variables. Database for each proxy variables was established based on local administrative province. Future studies are required to define the weighting factor and standardization method to calculate the vulnerability indicator for agricultural infrastructure against climate change.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
• /
• v.28 no.3
• /
• pp.444-452
• /
• 2012

This study aims at assessing vulnerability of water quality and aquatic ecosystem to climate change by using proxy variables. Vulnerability to climate change is defined as a function of exposure to climate, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity. Detailed proxy variables were selected considering availability and then standardized by re-scaling concept. After adequate weights were assigned to standardized proxy variables by Delphi technique, vulnerability index was calculated. As results, vulnerability of adjacent regions to coastal areas include water quality and aquatic ecosystem is relatively higher than that of inland areas, and especially adjacent region to the western and southeast seas, and Jeju show high vulnerabilities. Vulnerability in the future was performed based on A1B scenario (IPCC, 2000). Temporally, the increase of vulnerability from 2050s to 2100s may be larger than the increase from 2000s to 2050s. Because vulnerability index was estimated through the relationship among various proxy variables, it is important to consider characteristics of local region with measurements and policies for reduction of sensitivity and enhancement of adaptive capacity on climate change. This study is expected to be useful in planning adaptation measures and selecting priority to the policy on climate change.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
• /
• v.59 no.3
• /
• pp.29-39
• /
• 2017

In this study, the GPM (Global Precipitation Mission) IMERG (Integrated Multi-satellitE retrievals for GPM) rainfall data was verified and evaluated using ground AWS (Automated Weather Station) and radar in order to investigate the availability of GPM IMERG rainfall data. The SPI (Standardized Precipitation Index) was calculated based on the GPM IMERG data and also compared with the results obtained from the ground observation data for the Hoengseong Dam and Yongdam Dam areas. For the radar data, 1.5 km CAPPI rainfall data with a resolution of 10 km and 30 minutes was generated by applying the Z-R relationship ($Z=200R^{1.6}$) and used for accuracy verification. In order to calculate the SPI, PERSIANN_CDR and TRMM 3B42 were used for the period prior to the GPM IMERG data availability range. As a result of latency verification, it was confirmed that the performance is relatively higher than that of the early run mode in the late run mode. The GPM IMERG rainfall data has a high accuracy for 20 mm/h or more rainfall as a result of the comparison with the ground rainfall data. The analysis of the time scale of the SPI based on GPM IMERG and changes in normal annual precipitation adequately showed the effect of short term rainfall cases on local drought relief. In addition, the correlation coefficient and the determination coefficient were 0.83, 0.914, 0.689 and 0.835, respectively, between the SPI based GPM IMERG and the ground observation data. Therefore, it can be used as a predictive factor through the time series prediction model. We confirmed the hydrological utilization and the possibility of real time drought monitoring using SPI based on GPM IMERG rainfall, even though results presented in this study were limited to some rainfall cases.

• Journal of Climate Change Research
• /
• v.7 no.3
• /
• pp.269-282
• /
• 2016

Watershed area can be submerged due to constructions and management of dams, and these change can impact not only on ecosystem and environment of river basin area but also on local climate. This study is conducted to construct and classify climate zones of Andong Dam watershed where the area is submerged due to the construction of the dam. By applying Principal Components Analysis (PCA) and Getis-Ord $Gi^*$ statistics, three climate zones were classified for the result. Each zone was then analyzed and validated with climatic and geological features including topography, land cover, and forest type map. As a result of the analysis, there was a difference in temperature, elevation, precipitation and tree species distribution among the zones. Also, an analysis of land cover map showed that there were more agricultural land near Andong Reservoir. This study on the climatic classification is considered to be useful as the basis for decision-making or policy enforcement regarding ecosystem, environmental management or climate change response.

• Journal of Climate Change Research
• /
• v.1 no.1
• /
• pp.21-30
• /
• 2010

In this study, vulnerability of water resources to climate change was assessed in terms of flood, drought and water management. Criteria and indicators were employed for assessing the vulnerability. The criteria used to assess the vulnerability was sensitivity of the study area, the exposure to climate and the adaptability to climate change. These criteria were quantified and standardized using corresponding indicators. Vulnerability of water resources to climate change is assessed to be generally increasing over time. The appropriate watershed scales are the large drainage basin for national level vulnerability assessment and the small drainage basin for local one.