• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Sciences Society Conference
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• 2006.11a
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• pp.421-424
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• 2006

종래의 개발은 양면성을 가지고 있다. 하나는 개발로 인한 경제적 효율성과 편리성 부분이고, 다른 하나는 그러한 개발로 인한 자연훼손 및 생태계 파괴이다. 이로 인해 개발과 보전은 양립할 수 없는 상반적인 개념으로 받아들여져 왔고, 개발론과 보전론의 대립적 구도가 지속되어 왔다. 우리나라는 국토의 65% 이상이 산지이기 때문에 산지의 부분적 개발은 피할 수 없는 사회적 요구인 동시에, 산지는 자연생태계의 보고로서 생태계 보전이 필수적인 지역이다. 이러한 산지 개발과 보전에 대한 상반적 이해를 통합하여 자연과 인간의 공생체계를 갖추기 위해서는 인간중심의 사고에서 탈피하여 사람과 생태계 그리고 자연을 하나로 보는 총체적인 측면에서 접근하는 새로운 패러다임이 설정되어야 한다. 본 연구에서는 산지의 정량적인 가치를 평가하기 위해 시 공간적으로 다양한 인자들에 대해 시스템적인 관점에서 그 중요성을 고려하고자 하는 에머지 개념을 통해 산지 본래의 가치를 평가하였다. 에머지 개념은 그 동안 생태계가치평가, 개발사업의 편익-비용평가, 환경수용력 평가, 개발대안 평가, 환경계정, 환경훼손 소송관련 비용 평가 등에 적용되었다. 이러한 에머지 개념을 이용한 평가 방법을 통한 의사결정이 이루어지면 산지뿐만이 아닌 생태계의 지속가능한 이용을 실현하기 위한 적절한 정책의 선택과 이의 이행 실효성을 높일 수 있을 것으로 기대되며, 자연환경 가치의 정량적 평가를 통해서 우리는 한층 더 자연환경 및 자원의 다원적 기능에 대한 자각을 할 수 있을 것으로 판단된다.

• Proceedings of the KGS Conference
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• 2006.06a
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• pp.161-162
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• 2006

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.141-154
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• 2016

This study was conducted laying the focus on finding the mutual action between the substantial ecological value and economic system in the national land, and calculating the environmental carrying capacity and sustainability of the national land using the emergy synthesis. Particularly, this study pays attention watchfully to the reality that the analytic framework to analyze sustainability is not arranged well, as the concept of sustainable development considering environmental carrying capacity, which becomes a widely discussed topic today, is defined differently according to the subjective views of respective researchers, and the situation which needs in-depth evaluation on the interaction between nature and economy which becomes the fundamental of sustainable development. This study also aims at groping for correct direction for the national land development by calculating the environmental carrying capacity and index value which is appropriate to the national land and providing the framework for preparing the policy to induce the sustainable use and management of the national land. The concept of emergy synthesis which is used for the evaluation of environmental carrying capacity and sustainability in the national land, as in this case, can notify the information on current situation of the national land as well as explain how the national land transforms according to time pass (the role of information synthesis), and gives knowledge if the national land policies advances toward the direction of sustainable development (the role of policy evaluation and observation). Emergy synthesis also can take role for selecting best policy on the process of decision making on the exploitation of the national land (the role on the process of decision making).

• Journal of the Korean Society for Marine Environment & Energy
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.60-67
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• 2010

For sustainable use of the resources of uninhabited islands of Korea, their ecological economic potential needs to be fully integrated into their management policy and the carrying capacity of the islands should be evaluated before using or developing them. The emergy methodology was used to evaluate the ecological economic value and carrying capacity of Sungap-do which is an uninhabited island in Incheon, Korea. The system boundary for the emergy evaluation of the island included the sea area within 1km from the high tide level, following the management boundary for the uninhabited islands of Korea stipulated in the Law on the Conservation and Management of Uninhabited Islands. The total renewable emergy input to Sungap-do was $1.04{\times}10^{20}$ sej/yr from tidal energy. The annual ecological economic contribution of the island was evaluated high at 29.9 billion Em￦/yr. If Sungap-do were developed to the national average, its carrying capacity was 6,586 persons at the current living standard of Korea. The carrying capacity of Sungap-do for the long-term sustainability scenario was 2,337 persons at the same living standard as in the developed scenario. When only emergy contribution of the land area was considered, the carrying capacity of Sungap-do sharply decreased to 14 persons for the developed scenario and 5 persons for the long-term sustainability scenario. The carrying capacity of the uninhabited islands of Korea including Sungap-do, thus, needs to be considered from the initial stage of utilization or development projects to sustain the ecosystem benefits and their sustainable uses.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Marine Environment & Safety
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.135-143
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• 2008

An emergy concept was used to evaluate the environment and economy of the estuarine areas of Yeongsan River, Seomjin River, and Han River in Korea. The emergy evaluations clearly showed ecological and socioeconomic characteristics of the estuarine areas that act as ecological and economic centers of surrounding areas. River, tide, and rain provided most of the renewable emergy inputs to the estuarine areas with their contribution to the total emergy input less than 8%. The estuarine areas mostly relied for their operation on the purchased emergy which accounted for $92{\sim}98%$ of the total emergy input to the systems. Emergy indices such as emergy use per unit area, population carrying capacity, environmental loading ratio, and emergy sustainability index revealed that the estuarine areas of Yeongsan River, Seomjin River, and Han River are not sustainable at the current level of economic activities in the areas. The ecological economic values of the environment of the areas were in the range of $7.29{\sim}22.06$ million Em\/ha/yr. They are more than twice that for the whole country, indicating the ecological and economic importance of the eatuarine areas. It is, therefore, urgent to establish and implement estuarine management policies to protect and restore the ecological and economic potentials of the estuarine areas of Yeongsan River, Seomjin River, and Han River. Management plans for the estuarine areas should include both demand-side measures such as reduction of population and economic concentration and consideration of ecological carrying capacity in planning stages for utilization and development of the areas, and supply-side ones such as restoration of degraded ecosystems and construction of new productive ecosystems.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.13-20
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• 2013

An emergy concept was used to evaluate the contributions of the Youngsan River Estuary to the Korean economy from systems and ecosystem service perspectives. Total emergy input to the estuary was $9.42{\times}10^{20}$ sej/yr with the chemical potential of river inflow accounting for 73% of the total and tidal energy for the remaining 27%, reflecting the unique environmental characteristics of estuaries where rivers meet sea. From the systems perspective, the estuary ecosystem contributed 179.9 billion em\/yr (14.91 million em\/ha/yr or 13,526 em$/ha/yr). Four ecosystem services of the Youngsan River Estuary were selected for the emergy evaluation: fishery production, pollutant removal, aesthetic function, and scientific research information. Aesthetic function contributed the most to the Korean economy with 179.9 billion em\/yr, followed by fishery production (101.1 billion em\/yr), pollutant removal (32.6 billion em\/yr), and scientific research information (934 million em\/yr). Emergy-based values of the selected ecosystem services of the estuary were higher than those calculated by economic methodologies.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.45-51
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• 1999

Emergy concept was used to evaluate the contributions of a dam construction to the real wealth of our economy. A dam that is proposed as a multi-purpose dam was used to illustrate emergy evaluation methodology. Models for emergy evaluation were constructed with energy systems language, a symbolic modeling language which presents network properties of systems holistically. Water supply was the most important contribution in terms of emergy, which reflects that the dam is proposed for stable water supply to a local region. Generation of electricity was the second in emergy benefits of the dam. Emergy costs were more evenly distributed among the costs which would occur as a result of the dam construction. Emergy yield ratio was 1.30 if sediments are not included, and 1.15 if sediments are included, which results in net yield in both cases. The ratio would, however, fall below 1.0 if rare species within the system boundary are lost as a result of the dam construction because of the high emergy value included in biotic species, which means that emergy costs will be greater than emergy benefits. This study illustrated a new methodology in environmental impact assessment to better manage our environments in an age of diminishing resources.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.507-514
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• 2013

The Nakdong River being used as drinking water sources for the Busan metropolitan city has the vulnerability of water management due to the fact that industrial areas are located in the upper Nakdong River. This study used emergy analysis method to evaluate ecological-economics of water treatment systems of D water treatment plant (WTP) where located in the downstream of the Nakdong River. The emergy methodology is a system evaluation tool that uses energy as the common currency to compare different resources on a common basis. Emergy yield ratio (EYR) and emergy sustainability index (EmSI) of D WTP were 1.16 and 0.18, respectively. It means not resources and sustainable system but consumer goods and not sustainable system. Ratio of emergy benefit to the purchaser (EBP) shows 2.7 times higher than economic costs. To change the weak water source and situations we need to diversity water intake.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.305-314
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• 2008

As forest land takes up 65% of the Korean peninsula, there have been continuing conflicts between the development and conservation of forest land. As the income level has changed over time, the usage of forest land in society has changed. There has been increasing demands for forest land for urban development and recreational use. On the other hand, a large proportion of the land is required to be preserved for the forest and the natural ecosystem in it. The existing management system for the forest land has been designed focusing on the management of the trees on the land, and not the land itself. Due to this limitation, the current management system of forest land has failed to protect the forest land from being developed indiscreetly, making it difficult to conserve and develop the forest land in an efficient way. A major question in forest land management is how to integrate economic use activities with the supporting ecosystems to maximize performance of the ecological-economic system. In order to promote sustainable use of forest resources, and to achieve efficient forest land management, it is prerequisite to evaluation on forest resources of natural ecosystems. Quantitative measures are needed that signify how necessary the services and products of forested ecosystems are to human endeavors. In this study, the natural wealth provided by forest land was quantified based on emergy synthesis. Emergy is a universal measure of real wealth of the work of nature and society made on a common basis. Thus, Calculations of emergy provide a basis for making choices about environment and economy following the general public policy to maximize real wealth. The goals of forest land management to achieve balance between the ecology and economy of its integrated system and to foster equity among the diverse outcomes of the forest land were assessed with emergy. Emergy was demonstrated to holistically integrated and quantify the interconnections of a coupled nature-human system allowing the goals of ecological balance and outcome equity to be measured quantitatively. Doing so will provide a better understanding of the basis of forest land wealth and the consequences of management decisions.