• The Korean Journal of Ecology
• /
• v.28 no.6
• /
• pp.353-363
• /
• 2005

We developed a local-scale ecophysiological model, Sim-CYCLE Fine by modifying Sim-CYCLE which was developed for a global scale simulation. Sim-CYCLE fine is able to simulate not only carbon fluxes but also plant growth with various time-steps from an hour to a month. The model outputs of $CO_2$ flux and biomass/LAI were highly reliable; we validated the model results with measurements from the eddy covariance technique and the harvest method ($R^2$ values of around 0.9 for both). The results suggested that the phonology and the seasonal dynamics of the $C_3/C4$ plant communities affected significantly the carbon fluxes and the plant growth during the plant growing season.

• International Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration
• /
• v.17 no.3
• /
• pp.100-106
• /
• 2009

As an effort to prevent environmental problems caused by ozone depletion and global warming, alternative refrigerants are being developed, and one of the candidates is carbon dioxide. To overcome slightly low efficiency of $CO_2$ refrigeration system, air-conditioning cycle using an ejector was suggested. Ejector compensates throttling loss in an expansion device by reducing compression work. In this study, the ejector refrigeration cycle using $CO_2$ as a refrigerant is investigated to understand the effect of the mixing section diameter and refrigerant charge amount on the performance. If mixing section diameter is too large or too small, either cases show low performance. The optimum refrigerant charge amount which gives the best performance is found for standard operating conditions. The air-conditioning cycle was analyzed for several operating conditions.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
• /
• v.34 no.6
• /
• pp.382-390
• /
• 2012

Global warming has been hot issue world wide. Korea has been dealing with the global issue under the slogan of low carbon and green-growth such as setting national greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction targets and allocation to each industrial sector. Infrastructure construction, in which enormous social overhead capital (SOC) is input, has great role as one of the actions. Road is one of the representative infrastructure and large amount of resources is utilized in its construction, operation and maintenance stage. The estimation methodology of life cycle carbon emissions was developed and applied to a case study of highway currently under construction in this study. Also, total carbon emissions of all the highway in South Korea at present (2009) and cumulative carbon emissions from 2009 to 2020 were estimated using the results of case study.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
• /
• v.42 no.4
• /
• pp.397-415
• /
• 2022

As the global warming problem becomes serious, the need for carbon cycle education in school is increasing. Adopting systems thinking ability is needed to understand the carbon cycle systematically. Furthermore, under the rapid change of environment, society, and economy, systems thinking ability is being emphasized as it can strengthen the competencies of students who will be leading the future society. The purposes of this study are as follows: first, is developing the systems thinking instrument for the carbon cycle and the rubric for analysis of systems thinking instrument. The second is analyzing the systems thinking ability of students using the developed instrument and rubric. In order to perform this study, previous studies related to the carbon cycle and systems thinking education were analyzed. Based on the analysis results, the systems thinking instrument for the carbon cycle and rubric were developed. The systems thinking ability was analyzed by implementing the developed instrument and rubric to 172 high school and university students. The results of this study are as follows: first, the systems thinking instrument for the carbon cycle was developed, and a rubric utilization guide was constructed. The instrument and rubric were modified through pilot study for middle school students producing expert opinion in relation to systems thinking and carbon cycle. Second, the systems thinking ability of students was analyzed. Consequently, students had systems thinking ability fully at a low level, such as identifying the variables related to the carbon cycle. However, it was shown that they lacked the systems thinking ability at a high level, such as time delay and feedback processes. The importance of the carbon cycle has been increasing since the global warming is the most pressing issue and significant environmental problem facing us today. Application of the systems thinking ability can contribute to understanding these complex problems and finding fundamental solutions.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
• /
• v.98 no.1
• /
• pp.33-48
• /
• 2009

Forests store carbon dioxide ($CO_2$), one of the major factors of global warming, in vegetation and soils through photosynthesis process. In addition, woods deposit $CO_2$ for a long term until the harvested wood is decomposed or burned, and deforested areas could be expanded the carbon sinks through reforestation. Forests are a lso able to decrease temperature through transpiration and contribute to control the micro climate in global climate systems. Consequently, forests are considered as one of major sinks of greenhouse gases for mitigating global warming. It is very important to develop a Korea specific forest carbon flux model for preparing adaptation measures to climate change. In this study, we compared the climate change impact models in forests developed in foreign countries and analyzed the applicability of the models to Korean forest. Also we selected models applicable to Korean forest and suggested approaches for developing Korean specific model.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
• /
• 2001.06e
• /
• pp.524-529
• /
• 2001

Because of the ozone layer depletion and global wanning, new alternative refrigerants are being developed. Among them, HFC refrigerants are thought promising, but some European countries are arguing that these refrigerants are also harmful to the global wanning. Therefore, natural refrigerants should be considered as an eventual alternative in refrigerators and heat pumps. In the present study, the supercritical gas cooling process are computationally analysed by employing various turbulence models of carbon dioxide in a trans critical refrigeration cycle. The gas cooling process near the critical point experiences a drastic change in thermodynamic and transport properties, thus the heat transfer characteristics would be different from those of two or single phases. Based on the computational results, the correlations to estimate the near-critical heat transfer characteristics will are obtained.

• Clean Technology
• /
• v.28 no.3
• /
• pp.203-209
• /
• 2022

An environmental evaluation was conducted by employing LCA methodology for a mechanical seal manufacturing process that uses recycled silicon recovered from end-of-cycle PV modules. The recycled silicon was purified and reacted with carbon to synthesize β-SiC particles. Then the particles underwent compression molding, calcination and heat treatment to produce a product. Field data were collected and the potential environmental impacts of each stage were calculated using the LCI DB of the Ministry of Environment. The assessment was based on 6 categories, which were abiotic resource depletion, acidification, eutrophication, global warming, ozone depletion and photochemical oxidant creation. The environmental impacts by category were 45 kg CO₂ for global warming and 2.23 kg C₂H₄ for photochemical oxide creation, and the overall environmental impact by photochemical oxide creation, resource depletion and global warming had a high contribution of 98.7% based on weighted analysis. The wet process of fine grinding and mixing the raw silicon and carbon, and SiC granulation were major factors that caused the environmental impacts. These impacts need to be reduced by converting to a dry process and using a system to recover and reuse the solvent emitted to the atmosphere. It was analyzed that the environmental impacts of resource depletion and global warming decreased by 53.9% and 60.7%, respectively, by recycling silicon from end-of-cycle PV modules. Weighted analysis showed that the overall environmental impact decreased by 27%, and the LCA analysis confirmed that recycling waste modules could be a major means of resource saving and realizing carbon neutrality.

• KOREAN JOURNAL OF PACKAGING SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
• /
• v.29 no.3
• /
• pp.181-193
• /
• 2023

In this study, we conducted a comparative life cycle assessment (LCA) of two different products, considering reusable and single-use packaging for fresh food distribution. For reusable packaging, we utilized expanded polyethylene (EPE), while for comparison, a disposable box made of widely used expanded polystyrene (EPS) was selected. We comprehensively analyzed the environmental impacts of production, transportation, reprocessing (for reused boxes), and disposal across 18 impact categories. Upon analyzing the actual reuse of 300 rounds of fresh food, the cumulative global warming potential (GWP) values for the EPE box were found to be 280.21 kg carbon dioxide (CO₂) eq, demonstrating a significant 75% reduction compared to those of the EPS box. Furthermore, it was observed that the GWP values for the EPE boxes became equivalent to those of the EPS boxes after 12 rounds of reuse. In conclusion, reusable packaging shows substantial potential to contribute to the reduction of environmental burdens, aligning well with global environmental requirements for sustainable food distribution and related industries.

• Atmosphere
• /
• v.24 no.3
• /
• pp.303-315
• /
• 2014

Terrestrial ecosystem plays the important role as carbon sink in the global carbon cycle. Understanding of interactions of terrestrial carbon cycle with climate is important for better prediction of future climate change. In this paper, terrestrial carbon cycle is investigated by Hadley Centre Global Environmental Model, version 2, Carbon Cycle (HadGEM2-CC) that considers vegetation dynamics and an interactive carbon cycle with climate. The simulation for future projection is based on the three (8.5/4.5/2.6) representative concentration pathways (RCPs) from 2006 to 2100 and compared with historical land carbon uptake from 1979 to 2005. Projected changes in ecological features such as production, respiration, net ecosystem exchange and climate condition show similar pattern in three RCPs, while the response amplitude in each RCPs are different. For all RCP scenarios, temperature and precipitation increase with rising of the atmospheric $CO_2$. Such climate conditions are favorable for vegetation growth and extension, causing future increase of terrestrial carbon uptakes in all RCPs. At the end of 21st century, the global average of gross and net primary productions and respiration increase in all RCPs and terrestrial ecosystem remains as carbon sink. This enhancement of land $CO_2$ uptake is attributed by the vegetated area expansion, increasing LAI, and early onset of growing season. After mid-21st century, temperature rising leads to excessive increase of soil respiration than net primary production and thus the terrestrial carbon uptake begins to fall since that time. Regionally the NEE average value of East-Asia ($90^{\circ}E-140^{\circ}E$, $20^{\circ}N{\sim}60^{\circ}N$) area is bigger than that of the same latitude band. In the end-$21^{st}$ the NEE mean values in East-Asia area are $-2.09PgC\;yr^{-1}$, $-1.12PgC\;yr^{-1}$, $-0.47PgC\;yr^{-1}$ and zonal mean NEEs of the same latitude region are $-1.12PgC\;yr^{-1}$, $-0.55PgC\;yr^{-1}$, $-0.17PgC\;yr^{-1}$ for RCP 8.5, 4.5, 2.6.

• Journal of Electrochemical Science and Technology
• /
• v.9 no.3
• /
• pp.163-168
• /
• 2018

Biomass waste-derived carbon is an attractive alternative with environmental benignity to obtain carbon material. In this study, we prepare carbon from coffee grounds as a biomass precursor using a simple, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly method through physical activation using only steam. The coffee-derived carbon, having a micropore-rich structure and a low extent of graphitization of disordered carbon, is developed and directly applied to lithium-ion battery anode material. Compared with the introduction of the Ketjenblack (KB) conducting agent (i.e., coffee-derived carbon with KB), the coffee-derived carbon itself achieves a reversible capacity of ~200 mAh/g (0.54 lithium per 6 carbons) at a current density of 100 mA/g after 100 cycles, along with excellent cycle stability. The origin of highly reversible lithium storage is attributed to the consistent diffusion-controlled intercalation/de-intercalation reaction in cycle life, which suggests that the bulk diffusion of lithium is favorable in the coffee-derived carbon itself, in the absence of a conducting agent. This study presents the preparation of carbon material through physical activation without the use of chemical activation agents and demonstrates an application of coffee-derived carbon in energy storage devices.