Atmosphere (대기)

Korean Meteorological Society (한국기상학회)
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An Assessment of the Effectiveness of Cloud Seeding as a Measure of Air Quality Improvement in the Seoul Metropolitan Area

서울에서의 미세먼지 저감을 위한 인공강수 가능성 진단

  • Song, Jae In (Department of Atmospheric Sciences, Yonsei University) ;
  • Yum, Seong Soo (Department of Atmospheric Sciences, Yonsei University)
  • 송재인 (연세대학교 대기과학과) ;
  • 염성수 (연세대학교 대기과학과)
  • Received : 2019.09.18
  • Accepted : 2019.11.12
  • Published : 2019.12.31
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Abstract

Cloud seeding experiment has been proposed as a way to alleviate severe air pollution problem because, if successful, artificially produced precipitation through cloud seeding could scavenge out some portion of air pollutants. As a first step to verify the practicality of such experiment, seedability of the clouds observed in Seoul is assessed by examining statistical characteristics of some relevant meteorological variables. Analyses of 9 years of Korea Meteorological Agency Seoul station data indicate that as PM10 mass concentration increases, cloud amount, liquid water path, and ice water path decrease, but the difference between temperature and dew point temperature tends to increase. Such finding suggests that cloud seeding becomes less feasible as air pollution becomes more severe in the Seoul metropolitan area, at least in a statistical sense. For some individual severe air pollution events, however, seedable clouds may exist and indeed cloud seeding experiments can be successful. Therefore, detailed investigation on cloud seedability for individual severe air pollution events are highly required to make a concrete assessment of cloud seeding as a way to alleviate severe air pollution problem.

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References

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