• Journal of Korean Society for Quality Management
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.1-14
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• 2004

As environmental issues have been become critical concerns of business, many domestic small and medium enterprises(SME's) are rapidly accepting environmental management systems(EMS) that confirm ISO 14001 guidelines. The purpose of this paper is to present the results of an empirical study carried out on a sample of certified SME's with the aim of identifying obstacles encountered in adopting ISO 14001 standards and the impact of environmental systems on corporate performance after implementation of the ISO 14001 registration process. Data from this study show that the vast majority of respondents reported environmental improvements related to the implementation of an ISO 14001 EMS, especially in the area of employees' participation of the environmental management and responsibilities for reducing negative impacts, energy and resource conservation, materials reuse, and raising top management commitment. The greatest obstacles for implementing the ISO 14001 standard are lack of cooperation and a scarcity of resources such as personnel, money, and time. Results of this study serve as a reference point understanding the problems in the implementation of ISO 14001 in other small and medium firms.

• Architectural research
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.21-29
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• 2019

Recent years in Korea, some new developed buildings are only using electricity as power for heating, cooling, bathing and even cooking which means except electricity, there is no natural gas or other kinds of energy used in such kind of building. In vehicle industry area, scientists already invented electric vehicle as an environment friendly vehicle; after that, in architecture design and construction field, buildings only using electricity appeared; the curiosity of the environment impact of energy consumption by such kind of building lead me to do this research. In general, electricity is known as a clean energy resource reasoned by it is noncombustible energy resource; however, although there is no environmental pollution by using electricity, electricity generation procedure in power plant may cause huge amount of environment pollution; especially, electricity generation from combusting coal in power plant could emit enormous air pollutants to the air. In this research, the yearly amount of air pollution by energy using under traditional way in research target building that is using natural gas for heating, bathing and cooking and electricity for lighting, equipment and cooling is compared with yearly amount of air pollution by only using electricity as power in the building; result shows that building that only uses electricity emits much more air pollutants than uses electricity and natural gas together in the building. According to the amount of air pollutants comparison result between two different energy application types in the building, residential SOFC (Solid oxide fuel cell) is simulated to apply in this building for decreasing environment pollution of the building; furthermore, high load factor could lead high efficiency of SOFC, in the scenario of simulating applying SOFC in the building, SOFC is shared by two or three households in spring and autumn to increase efficiency of the SOFC. In sum, this research is trying to demonstrate electricity is a conditioned environment friendly energy resource; in the meanwhile, SOFC is simulated efficiently applying in the building only using electricity as power to decrease the large amount of air pollutants by energy using in the building. Energy consumption of the building is analyzed by calibrated commercial software Design Builder; the calibrated mathematical model of SOFC is referred from other researcher's study.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.171-194
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• 2020

We revisit the impact of oil shocks on the Korean economy and examine how this impact varies depending on a business cycle. First, we estimate the probability of a recession through a logistic probability distribution, and correct the probability to match business cycles announced by the Korea National Statistical Office. We set up a STVAR model to analyze the response of macroeconomic variables to oil shocks according to business cycles. We find that oil shocks during the recession have a negative effect on GDP in the mid- and long-term, but during the expansion, GDP does not show a statistically significant response to oil shocks. We presume that this finding is associated with the factors of both the increase in demand for consumption and the increase in current account during the economic boom. Also, we find that the impact of oil shocks on the price level was also observed differently in terms of the persistence of inflation by business cycle. These results highlight the importance of an application of a regime switching model, which has been widely used in energy economics in recent years.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.729-751
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• 2005

RPS(Renewable Portfolio Standards) is an institutional device to promote use of renewable energy through market mechanism by making renewable energy to constitute a pre-announced portion of the electricity production. We measure economic impacts of the introduction of RPS to domestic electricity market at the levels of electricity market, individual industrial sectors and the economy as a whole. First, we examine the TREC(Tradable Renewable Energy Credits) market, where the credits in excess of the obligation of the renewable energy production are sold to those who have to meet the obligation through purchased credits. We then measure end-users' additional cost originating from the introduction of RPS and TREC in electricity production, and their impacts on price and supply in the retail electricity market. Next, using input-output analysis, we measure economic impacts of the changes in retail price and supply on individual industrial sectors and the economy as a whole. Among many others, we find small price effect and large GDP effect - sectoral electricity price rises at around 5%, sectoral price level rises by 0.258%, and sectoral GDP declines by 1.940% on average by the year 2011.

• Clean Technology
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.269-274
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• 2018

In this study, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of wet tissue manufacturing process was performed. The wet tissue manufacturing process consists of preparation of wetting agent (chemical liquid), impregnation of nonwoven fabric into wetting agent and primary and secondary packaging. Data and information were collected on the input and output of the actual process from a certain company and the database of the Korea Ministry of Environment and some foreign countries (when Korean unavailable) were employed to connect the upper and the lower process flow. Based on the above and the potential environmental impacts of the wet tissue manufacturing process were calculated. As a result of the characterization, Ozone Layer Depletion (OD) is 3.46.E-06 kg $CFC_{11}$, Acidification (AD) is 5.11.E-01 kg $SO_2$, Abiotic Resource Depletion (ARD) is $3.52.E+00\;1yr^{-1}$, Global Warming (GW) is 1.04.E+02 kg $CO_2$, Eutrophication (EUT) is 2.31.E-02 kg ${PO_4}^{3-}$, Photochemical Oxide Creation (POC) was 2.22.E-02 kg $C_2H_4$, Human Toxicity (HT) was 1.55.E+00 kg 1,4 DCB and Terrestrial Ecotoxicity (ET) was 5.82.E-04 kg 1,4 DCB. In order to reduce the environmental impact of the manufacturing process, it is necessary to improve the overall process as other general cases and change the raw materials including packaging materials with less environmental impact. Conclusively, the energy consumed in the manufacturing process has emerged as a major issue, and this needs to be reconsidered other options such as alternative energy. Therefore, it is recommended that a process system should be redesigned to improve energy efficiency and to change to an energy source with lower environmental impact. Due to the nature of LCA, the final results of this study can be varied to some extent depending on the type of LCI DB employed and may not represent of all wet tissue manufacturing processes in the current industry.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
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• v.24 no.68
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• pp.51-65
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• 2001

This study is to make LCIA(Life Cycle Impact Assessment) easier as a methodology of environmental scores(called E-score) that integrated environmental load of each emission substance based on environmental damage such as in human health, ecosystem and resources category. The concept is to analyzes the LCI(Life Cycle Inventory) and defines the level of environment damages for human health, ecosystem and resources to objective impact assessment standard, and makes the base of marginal damage to calculate the damage factor, which can present the indication that can establish the standard value of environmental impact. First, damages to human health are calculated by fate analysis, effect analysis and damage analysis to get the damage factor of health effect as a DALY(Disability Adjusted Life Years) unit. Second, damages to ecosystem are calculated by fate analysis, effect analysis and damage analysis to get the damage factor of the effect as a PDF(Potentially Disappeared Fraction) unit through linking potentially increased disappeared fraction. Third, damages to resources are carried out by resource analysis and damage analysis for linking the lower fate to surplus energy conception to get damage factor as a MJ(Mega Joule) unit. For the ranking of relative environment load level each other, LCIA can be carried out effectively by applying this E-score methodology to the particular emission substances. A case study has been introduced for the emission substances coming out of a tire manufacturer in Korea. It is to show how to work the methodology. Based on such study result, product-designers or producers now can apply the E-scores presented in this study to the substances of emission list, and then calculate the environment load of the product or process in advance at any time and can see the environment performance comparatively and expected to contribute to the environmental improvement in view of environmental pollution prevention.

• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.52-61
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• 2020

The article examines the impact differences between producing concrete and asphalt. Both materials are widely used in the construction industry. Construction activities account for a large portion of greenhouse gases. Therefore, it is important to consider the Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) to reduce environmental impacts. In this study, the material processes were inputted into an LCA program called SimaPro. The database used for the study was Ecoinvent as it is one of the major databases within SimaPro. The materials were compared against impacts per kg of material produced as the functional unit. Each process was created using the materials, energy and transportation required to produce the materials. Waste streams were also included in the process to determine the impacts after the product was done with its useful life. Using the ReCiPe method, an LCA was conducted. Midpoint and endpoint categories were examined for both the productions. The processes had similar results for the human health and ecosystems categories; however asphalt was marginally higher for both. Asphalt had exceeded concrete in the resource impact category by 100 mPt. The results indicate that concrete is the more sustainable building material. Determination of various impacts of the materials is important for material selection.

• KIEAE Journal
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.111-116
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• 2010

Ecological villages should be designed not only for simply reducing environmental impact such as energy saving and alternative energy use, resource conservation and circulation, harmony with surrounding environment and nature, but also for encouraging social contact and community activities with the residents, especially the aged people. The aim of this paper is to find the ecological and social design elements for the ecological village planning derived through case studies. The case studies are selected from the environmental Co-housings in Western America, surveyed in the years of 2008 and 2009. The results are as follows; 1. The ecological design elements, although there are some differences in size and type, were found to be basically applied in every ecological villages. 2. The community activities are actively conducted with the participation of the residents based on a variety of programs. The two main purposes of the community activities are strengthening the residents' familiarity with each other and the volunteer services to the local community where they belong.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.693-710
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• 2022

Social interest in occupational safety and health is increasing due to ESG management and the implementation of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act. This study examines the current status of occupational accidents, which is the safety level of energy companies, and the impact of occupational accidents on the management performance (sales per capita, operating profit per capita, operating margin per capita) of energy companies over the period of 2015 to 2021 was empirically analyzed. As a result of the analysis, the level of occupational accidents in the 157 energy companies to be analyzed was lower than the occupational injury accident rate in Korea, but the disease rate was high.As a result of analyzing the impact of occupational accidents on management performance, it is estimated that an increase in the occupational accident rate reduces per capita sales, per capita operating profit, and gross margin rate.Through this study, the vulnerability of energy companies to occupational accidents was confirmed, and the direct and indirect costs of occupational accidents quantified the negative impact on management performance.Referring to the results of this study, energy companies should strengthen their efforts to prevent occupational accidents by increasing investment in safety and health to protect the lives of valuable workers and create sustainable business performance.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.195-217
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• 2020

The improvement of energy intensity is drawing attention as a way to achieve sustainable development. Energy price and technology level are the main factors affecting energy intensity, and empirical studies on the relationship between the variables have been conducted mainly in overseas countries. However, analyzing the relation between energy intensity, energy price and technology has not been studied in Korea. Therefore, this study analyzed the dynamic relationship between energy intensity, energy price, and total factor productivity (TFP) in Korea. As a result of the analysis, the three variables form a long-term equilibrium relationship. The increase in TFP reduces energy intensity in both short and long term, and the long-term effect is greater than short-term effect. On the other hand, energy price do not have a significant impact on energy intensity. Granger causality test results show that energy intensity and TFP granger cause each other, but energy price is weak-exogenous.