Suk-Jo Lee

Time-resolved measurements of PM2.5 carbonaceous aerosols at Gosan, Korea.

ABSTRACT In order to better understand the characteristics of atmospheric carbonaceous aerosol at a background site in Northeast Asia, semicontinuous organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC), and time-resolved water-soluble organic carbon (WSOC) were measured by a Sunset OC/EC and a PILS-TOC (particle-into-liquid sampler coupled with an online total organic carbon) analyzer, respectively, at the Gosan supersite on Jeju Island, Korea, in the summer (May 28–June 17) and fall (August 24–September 30) of 2009. Hourly average OC concentration varied in the range of approximately 0.87–28.38 μgC m−3, with a mean of 4.07 ± 2.60 μgC m−3, while the hourly average EC concentration ranged approximately from 0.04 to 8.19 μgC m−3, with a mean of 1.35 ± 0.71 μgC m−3, from May 28 to June 17, 2009. During the fall season, OC varied in the approximate range 0.9–9.6 μgC m−3, with a mean of 2.30 ± 0.80 μgC m−3, whereas EC ranged approximately from 0.01 to 5.40 μgC m−3, with a mean of 0.66 ± 0.38 μgC m−3. Average contributions of EC to TC and WSOC to OC were 26.0% ± 9.7% and 20.6% ± 7.4%, and 37.6% ± 23.5% and 57.2% ± 22.2% during summer and fall seasons, respectively. As expected, clear diurnal variation of WSOC/OC was found in summer, varying from 0.22 during the nighttime up to 0.72 during the daytime, mainly due to the photo-oxidation process. In order to investigate the effect of air mass pathway on the characteristics of carbonaceous aerosol, 5-day back-trajectory analysis was conducted using the HYSPLIT model. The air mass pathways were classified into four types: Continental (CC), Marine (M), East Sea (ES) and Korean Peninsula (KP). The highest OC/EC ratio of 3.63 was observed when air mass originated from the Continental area (CC). The lowest OC/EC ratio of 0.79 was measured when air mass originated from the Marine area (M). A high OC concentration was occasionally observed at Gosan due to local biomass burning activities. The contribution of secondary OC to total OC varied approximately between 8.4% and 32.2% and depended on air mass type. IMPLICATIONS Organic material contributes approximately 20–90% of the total fine particulate mass concentration at different sites over the world depending on location and season. Organic carbon consists of hundreds of compounds with a wide range of chemical and optical properties. A better understanding of the chemical characteristics of carbonaceous aerosol influenced by increasing anthropogenic pollution in the downwind regions of the East Asian continent is needed in order to determine their impacts on regional air quality and climate change.

Investigation on a Haze Episode of Fine Particulate Matter using Semi-continuous Chemical Composition Data

In this study, semi-continuous measurements of mass, organic and elemental carbon (OC and EC), black carbon (BC), and ionic species concentrations were made for the period of April 03~13, 2012, at a South Area Supersite at Gwangju. Possible sources causing the high concentrations of major chemical species in observed during a haze episode were investigated. The measurement results, along with meteorological parameters, gaseous pollutants data, air mass back trajectory analyses and PSCF (potential source contribution function) results, were used to study the haze episode. Substantial enhancements of OC, EC, BC, , , , , and CO concentrations were closely associated with air masses coming from regions of forest fires in southeastern China, suggesting likely an impact of the forest fires. Also the PSCF maps for EC, OC, , and demonstrate further that the long-range transport of smoke plumes of forest fires detected over the southeastern China could be a possible source of haze phenomena observed at the site. Another possible source leading to haze formation was likely from photochemistry of precursor gases such as volatile organic compounds, , and , resulting in accumulation of secondary organic aerosol, and . Throughout the episode, local wind directions were between 200 and , where two industrial areas are situated, with moderate wind speeds of 3~5 m/s, resulting in highly elevated concentration of with a maximum of 15 ppb. The peak occurring in the afternoon hours coincided with maximum ambient temperature () and ozone concentration (~100 ppb), and were driven by photochemistry of . As a result, the pattern of variations in relation to wind direction, and concentrations, and the strong correlation between and (

Emission factors of air toxics from semiconductor manufacturing in Korea

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Simulating Urban-Scale Air Pollutants and Their Predicting Capabilities over the Seoul Metropolitan Area

Abstract The development of local, accurate emission factors is very important for the estimation of reliable national emissions and air quality management. For that, this study is performed for pollutants released to the atmosphere with source-specific emission tests from the semiconductor manufacturing industry. The semiconductor manufacturing industry is one of the major sources of air toxics or hazardous air pollutants (HAPs); thus, understanding the emission characteristics of the emission source is a very important factor in the development of a control strategy. However, in Korea, there is a general lack of information available on air emissions from the semiconductor industry. The major emission sources of air toxics examined from the semiconductor manufacturing industry were wet chemical stations, coating applications, gaseous operations, photolithography, and miscellaneous devices in the wafer fabrication and semiconductor packaging processes. In this study, analyses of emission characteristics, and the estimations of emission data and factors for air toxics, such as acids, bases, heavy metals, and volatile organic compounds from the semiconductor manufacturing process have been performed. The concentration of hydrogen chloride from the packaging process was the highest among all of the processes. In addition, the emission factor of total volatile organic compounds (TVOCs) for the packaging process was higher than that of the wafer fabrication process. Emission factors estimated in this study were compared with those of Taiwan for evaluation, and they were found to be of similar level in the case of TVOCs and fluorine compounds.

A Review of the Integrated Strategy for Climate Change and Air Pollution Management

Abstract Urban-scale air pollutants for sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, particulate matter with aerodynamic diameter >10 μm, and ozone (O3) were simulated over the Seoul metropolitan area, Korea, during the period of July 2-11, 2002, and their predicting capabilities were discussed. The Air Pollution Model (TAPM) and the highly disaggregated anthropogenic and the biogenic gridded emissions (1 km × 1 km) recently prepared by the Korean Ministry of Environment were applied. Wind fields with observational nudging in the prognostic meteorological model TAPM are optionally adopted to comparatively examine the meteorological impact on the prediction capabilities of urban-scale air pollutants. The result shows that the simulated concentrations of secondary air pollutant largely agree with observed levels with an index of agreement (IOA) of >0.6, whereas IOAs of ∼0.4 are found for most primary pollutants in the major cities, reflecting the quality of emission data in the urban area. The observationally nudged wind fields with higher IOAs have little effect on the prediction for both primary and secondary air pollutants, implying that the detailed wind field does not consistently improve the urban air pollution model performance if emissions are not well specified. However, the robust highest concentrations are better described toward observations by imposing observational nudging, suggesting the importance of wind fields for the predictions of extreme concentrations such as robust highest concentrations, maximum levels, and >90th percentiles of concentrations for both primary and secondary urban-scale air pollutants.

Estimating PM Emission Factor from Coal-Fired Power Plants in Korea

The unequivocal risk of climate change, the weakness of energy security, and the problem of air quality will be possibly accelerated by the same reason, the enhanced fossil fuel dependancy in the future. It is obvious that greenhouse gases and air pollutants are mainly emitted from same sources. Moreover, greenhouse gases and air pollutants have their adversed impacts on same socio-economical, and environmental sectors. With these regards, several but limited studies have emphasized on the importance of the integrated management of climate change and air quality problem. In this study, we address the current trend of energy consumption and the change of air quality condition. Also the related policies are checked out in order to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and air pollutants in Korea. By surveying previous studies, it is shown that the cost of climate change actions can be reduced by air quality co-benefits and vis-a-versa. Also the integrated strategy for climate change and air quality is introduced in term of cost-effectiveness and co-benefit.

Emission Characteristics of Mercury in Zn Smelting Process

In Korea, PM (Particulate Matter) emissions caused by coal-fired power plants are measured by a system, so called Clean Air Policy Support System (CAPSS), which uses foreign emission factors. However, the system fails to reflect the characteristics of domestic power plants. In this regard, this study aims to develop local, accurate domestic emission factors. The study measured the amount of TSP (Total Suspended Particulates), PM10 and PM2.5 by collecting samples from the latter parts of pollution control devices which were installed at 3 bituminous-fired power plants and 3 anthracite-fired power plants. The results showed that the average concentrations of TSP, PM10 and PM2.5 measured at bituminous-fired power plants were 4.63 mg/, 2.96 mg/ and 3.07 mg/ respectively, much higher than those from anthracite-fired power plants (2.96 mg/, 2.47 mg/ and 1.37 mg/, respectively). In addition, bituminous-fired power plants showed higher ratios of PM10/TSP and PM2.5/TSP with 0.66 and 0.92, respectively, compared to 0.82 and 0.46, the ratios of PM10/TSP and PM2.5/TSP measured in anthracite-fired power plants. Emission factors based-on concentration measurements were also higher for bituminous-fired power plants, and PM with smaller particles tended to have bigger difference in emission factors between the two fuels. This study calculated the amount of PM emissions by using the estimated emission factors. When it comes to the PM emissions, it was less than that of CAPSS while similar to that of CleanSYS in its amount. It is expected that the emission factors developed by this study will be used in Korea replacing foreign emission factors currently used in Korea by ensuring the objectivity and reliability as domestic emission factors.

The effect of ozone and aerosols on the surface erythemal UV radiation estimated from OMI measurements

Stationary combustion sources such as coal-fired power plants, waste incinerators, industrial manufacturing, etc. are recognized as major sources of mercury emissions. Due to rapid economic growth, zinc production in Korea has increased significantly during the last 30 years. Total zinc production in Korea exceeded 739,000 tons in 2008, and Korea is currently the third largest zinc producing country in the world. Previous studies have revealed that zinc smelting has become one of the largest single sectors of total mercury emissions in the World. However, studies on this sector are very limited, and a large gap in the knowledge regarding emissions from this sector needs to be bridged. In this paper, Hg emission measurements were performed to develop emission factors from zinc smelting process. Stack sampling and analysis were carried out utilizing the Ontario Hydro method and US EPA method 101A. Preliminary data showed that concentrations in the flue gas ranged from 4.56 to with an average of , Hg(p) concentrations ranged from 0.03 to with an average of , and RGM concentrations ranged from 0.23 to with an average of . To date, emission factors of 7.5~8.0 g/ton for Europe, North America and Australia, and of 20 or 25 g/ton for Africa, Asia and South America are widely accepted by researchers. In this study, Hg emission factors were estimated using the data measured at the commercial facilities as emissions per ton of zinc product. Emission factors for mercury from zinc smelting pross ranged from 4.32 to 12.96 mg/ton with an average of 8.31 mg/ton. The emission factors that we obtained in this study are relatively low, considering Hg contents in the zinc ores and control technology in use. However, as these values are estimated by limited data of single measurement of each, the emission factor and total emission amount must be updated in future.

The Effect of the Chemical Lateral Boundary Conditions on CMAQ Simulations of Tropospheric Ozone for East Asia

Surface erythemal UV radiation is mainly affected by total column ozone, aerosols, clouds, and solar zenith angle. The effect of ozone on the surface UV radiation has been explored many times in the previous studies due to the decrease of ozone layer. In this study, we calculated the effect of aerosols on the surface UV radiation as well as that of ozone using data acquired from Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI). First, ozone, aerosol optical depth (AOD), and surface erythemal UVB radiation measured from satellite are compared with those from ground measurements. The results showed that the comparison for ozone was good with r2 of 0.92. For aerosol, there was difference between satellite measurements and surface measurements due to the insufficient information on aerosol in the retrieval algorithm. The r2 for surface erythemal UV radiation was high (∼0.94) but satellite measurements showed about 30% larger values than surface measurements on average by not considering the effect of absorbing aerosols in the retrieval process from satellite measurements. Radiative amplification factor (RAF) is used to access the effect of ozone and aerosol quantitatively. RAF for ozone was 0.97∼1.49 with solar zenith angle. To evaluate the effect of aerosol on the surface UV radiation, only clear-sky pixel data were used and solar zenith angle and total column amount of ozone were fixed. Also, RAF for aerosol was assessed according to the single scattering albedo (SSA) of aerosols. The results showed that RAF for aerosol with smaller SSA (< 0.90) was larger than that for with larger SSA (> 0.90). The RAF for aerosol was 0.09∼0.22 for the given conditions which was relatively small compared to that for ozone. However, considering the fact that aerosol optical depth can change largely in time and space while the total column amount of ozone does not change very much, it needs to include the effect of aerosol to predict the variations of surface UV radiation more correctly.

Impact of Acidification on the Solubility of Metal Species in Asian Desert Dusts: Results from Laboratory Experiments

The goal of this study is to investigate the effects of the chemical lateral boundary conditions (CLBCs) on Community Multi-scale Air Quality (CMAQ) simulations of tropospheric ozone for East Asia. We developed linking tool to produce CLBCs of CMAQ from Goddard Earth Observing System-Chemistry (GEOS-Chem) as a global chemistry model. We examined two CLBCs: the fixed CLBC in CMAQ (CLBC-CMAQ) and the CLBC from GEOS-Chem (CLBC-GEOS). The ozone fields by CMAQ simulation with these two CLBCs were compared to Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer (TES) satellite data, ozonesonde and surface measurements for May and August in 2008. The results with CLBC-GOES showed a better tropospheric ozone prediction than that with CLBC-CMAQ. The CLBC-GEOS simulation led to the increase in tropospheric ozone concentrations throughout the model domain, due to be influenced high ozone concentrations of upper troposphere and near inflow western and northern boundaries. Statistical evaluations also showed that the CLBC-GEOS case had better results of both the index of Agreement (IOA) and mean normalized bias. In the case of IOA, the CLBC-GEOS simulation was improved about 0.3 compared to CLBC-CMAQ due to the better predictions for high ozone concentrations in upper troposphere.