• Atmosphere
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.195-205
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• 2007

The influences of ice microphysical processes on urban heat island-induced convection and precipitation are numerically investigated using a cloud-resolving model (ARPS). Both warm- and cold-cloud simulations show that the downwind upward motion forced by specified low-level heating, which is regarded as representing an urban heat island, initiates moist convection and results in downwind precipitation. The surface precipitation in the cold-cloud simulation is produced earlier than that in the warm-cloud simulation. The maximum updraft is stronger in the cold-cloud simulation than in the warm-cloud simulation due to the latent heat release by freezing and deposition. The outflow formed in the boundary layer is cooler and propagates faster in the cold-cloud simulation due mainly to the additional cooling by the melting of falling hail particles. The removal of the specified low-level heating after the onset of surface precipitation results in cooler and faster propagating outflow in both the warm- and cold-cloud simulations.

• Atmosphere
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.257-271
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• 2011

The aim of this study is to examine weather modification by urbanization and human activities. The characteristics of the urban heat island (UHI) and precipitation in Seoul metropolitan area of Korea are investigated to demonstrate that cities can change or modify local and nearby weather and climate, and to confirm that cities can initiate convection, change the behavior of convective precipitation, and enhance downstream precipitation. The data used in this study are surface meteorological station data observed in Seoul and its nearby 5 cities for the period of 1960 to 2009, and 162 Automatic Weather System stations data observed in the Seoul metropolitan area from 1998 to 2009. Air temperature and precipitation amount tend to increase with time, and relative humidity decreases because of urbanization. Similar to previous studies for other cities, the average maximum UHI is weakest in summer and is strong in autumn and winter, and the maximum UHI intensity is more frequently observed in the nighttime than in the daytime, decreases with increasing wind speed, and is enhanced for clear skies. Relatively warm regions extend in the east-west direction and relatively cold regions are located near the northern and southern mountains inside Seoul. The satellite cities in the outskirts of Seoul have been rapidly built up in recent years, thus exhibiting increases in near-surface air temperature. The yearly precipitation amount during the last 50 years is increased with time but rainy days are decreased. The heavy rainfall events of more than $20mm\;hr^{-1}$ increases with time. The substantial changes observed in precipitation in Seoul seem to be linked with the accelerated increase in the urban sprawl in recent decades which in turn has induced an intensification of the UHI effect and enhanced downstream precipitation. We also found that the frequency of intense rain showers has increased in Seoul metropolitan area.

• Atmosphere
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.229-241
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• 2011

The continuous urbanizations by a rapid economic growth and a steady increase in population are expected to have a possible impact on meteorology in the downwind region. Long-term (1972~2007) trends of precipitation have been examined in the mid-Korean peninsula for the westerly condition only, along with the sensitivity simulations for a golden day (11 February 2009). During the long-term period, both precipitation amount (PA) and frequency (PF) in the downwind region (Chuncheon, Wonju, Hongcheon) of urban area significantly increased for the westerly and light precipitation ($PA{\leq}1mm\;d^{-1}$) cases, whereas PA and PF in the mountainous region (Daegwallyeong) decreased. The enhancement ratio of PA and PF for the downwind region vs. urban region remarkably increased, which implies a possible urbanization effect on downwind precipitation. In addition, the WRF simulation applied for one golden day demonstrates enhanced updraft and its associated convergence in the downwind area (about 60 km), leading to an increase in the cloud mixing ratio. The sensitivity experiments with the change in surface roughness demonstrates a slight increase in cloud water mixing ratio but a negligible effect on precipitation in the upwind region, whereas those with the change in heat source represents the distinctive convergence and its associated updraft in the downwind region but a decrease in liquid water, which may be attributable to the evaporation of cloud droplet by atmospheric heating induced by an increase in an anthropogenic heat. In spite of limitations in the observation-based analysis and one-day simulation, the current result could provide an evidence of the effect of urbanization on the light precipitation in the downwind region.

• Atmosphere
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.175-185
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• 2018

Characteristics of precipitation response to enhanced aerosols have been investigated during the severe haze events observed in Korea for 2011 to 2016. All 6-years haze events are classified into long-range transported haze (LH: 31%), urban haze (UH: 28%), and yellow sand (YS: 18%) in order. Long-range transported one is mainly discussed in this study. Interestingly, both LH (68%) and YS (87%) appear to be more frequently accompanied with precipitation than UH (48%). We also found out the different timing of precipitation for LH and YS, respectively. The variations of precipitation frequency for the LH event tend to coincide with aerosol variations specifically in terms of temporal covariation, which is in contrast with YS. Increased aerosol loadings following precipitation for the YS event seems to be primarily controlled by large scale synoptic forcing. Meanwhile, aerosols for the LH event may be closely associated with precipitation longevity through changes in cloud microphysics such that enhanced aerosols can increase smaller cloud droplets and further extend light precipitation at weaker rate. Notably, precipitation persisted longer than operational weather forecast not considering detailed aerosol-cloud interactions, but the timescale was limited within a day. This result demonstrates active interactions between aerosols and meteorology such as probable modifications of cloud microphysics and precipitation, synoptic-induced dust transport, and precipitation-scavenging in Korea. Understanding of aerosol potential effect on precipitation will contribute to improving the performance of numerical weather model especially in terms of precipitation timing and location.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.51 no.spc
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• pp.1057-1066
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• 2018

Climate change has been influenced on extreme precipitation events, which are major driving causes of flooding. Especially, most of extreme water-related disasters in Korea occur from floods induced by extreme precipitation events. However, future climate change scenarios simulated with Global Circulation Models (GCMs) or Reigonal Climate Models (RCMs) are limited to the application on medium and small size rivers and urban watersheds due to coarse spatial and temporal resolutions. Therefore, the current study introduces the state-of-the-art approaches and procedures of statistical downscaling techniques to resolve this limitation It is expected that the temporally downscaled data allows frequency analysis for the future precipitation and estimating the design precipitation for disaster prevention.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.314-320
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• 2006

Diffuse pollution from an urban area contributes to the significant pollution loading to a receiving water body. In this paper, rainfall runoffs from an urban basin with combined sewer systems located in the city of Daejeon were monitored to measure the rainfall runoff discharge rates and pollutant concentrations. Strong first flush effects were observed for all monitored rainfall runoffs. The first flush effects were closely related to rainfall intensity, while suspended solids were closely related to pollutant constituents. The observed averaged Event Mean Concentrations (EMCs) of Combined Sewer Overflows (CSOs) were 536.1 mg SS/L, 467.7 mg CODcr/L, 142.7 mg BOD/L, 16.5 mg TN/L, and 13.5 mg TP/L. Storage volumes for containing the first flush to improve water quality of the receiving stream can be estimated based on suspended solid concentration. In this study, retainment of the first flush equivalent to 5mm of precipitation could reduce diffuse pollution loading induced by CSOs to a receiving water body by up to 80% of suspended solid loading.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.148-153
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• 2011

EMRAS-2 (Environmental Modelling for RAdiation Safety, Phase 2) is an international comparison program, which is organized by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), in order to harmonize the modelling of radionuclide behavior in the environment. To do so, the urban contamination working group within EMRAS-2 has designed the hypothetical scenarios for a specified urban area. In this study, the importance of contaminated surfaces composing an urban environment was analyzed in terms of dose rate using METRO-K, which has been developed to take a Korean urban environment into account. The contribution of contaminated surfaces to exposure dose rate showed distinctly a great difference as a function of specified locations and time following a hypothetical event. Moreover, it showed a distinct difference according to the existence of precipitation, and its intensity. Therefore, if an urban area is contaminated radioactively by any unexpected incidents such as an accident of nuclear power plants or an explosion of radioactive dispersion devices (RDDs), appropriate measures should be taken with consideration of the type of surface composing the contaminated environment in order to minimize not only radiation-induced health detriment but also economic and social impacts.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.543-551
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• 2019

In China, serious environmental problems are induced by the extremely soft construction waste slurries in many urban areas, and there is no appropriate method to treat it presently. In this paper, four model tests were conducted to investigate the efficiency of waste slurry treatment by combining three conditioning agents which can change characteristics of the slurries with a traditional vacuum preloading method. The tests of size analysis of particle aggregate were conducted to investigate the influence of different conditioning agents on the size distributions of particle aggregate. During the model test, the discharged water volumes were monitored. The pore-size distribution and void ratio of the waste slurries after the vacuum preloading were measured by mercury intrusion porosimetry (MIP). It is found that 1) During the natural precipitation, volume of water out of the organic agent is higher than that of the mixed agent, but it is smaller than that of the mixed agent in the vacuum preloading stage; 2) the mixed agent has a higher total volume of water out than the organic agent and the inorganic agent after test, while the organic agent and the inorganic agent have little difference with respect to the drainage effect. The results demonstrate that the combination of mixed conditioning agent and vacuum preloading for the solid-liquid separation in waste slurry has a satisfactory effect and can be applied in engineering practice.

• Water Engineering Research
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.131-147
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• 2005

Today, a trend that tries to return the artificial space of a river to a natural one is expanding. But in Korea, which lies in the monsoon climate zone, rivers endure flood damage every year. Moreover, climatic change from global warming causes severe variations in precipitation patterns. Until recently, river restoration practices in Korea have followed partial restoration. These restorative treatments transformed artificial structures of the stream to natural ones and introduced natural vegetation by imitating natural or semi-natural streams. Treatment transformed the riparian structure and increased the diversity of micro-topography and vegetation. Furthermore, restoration recovered species composition, increased species diversity, and inhibited the establishment of exotic species. In particular, the Suip stream, which was left to its natural process for approximately 50 years, recovered its natural features almost completely through passive restoration. An urban stream, the Yangjae, and a rural stream, the Dongmoon, were restored partially by applying ecological principles. On the contrary, technological treatment applied to recover flood damage induced species composition far from the natural vegetation and decreased species diversity. Additionally, this treatment increased exotic species. The same results were found also in benthic invertebrate and fish fauna. The above-mentioned results reflect the importance of ecological considerations in river management.