• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.127-139
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• 2017

Measurements of net ecosystem exchange (NEE) of $CO_2$ based on the eddy covariance technique provide reasonable carbon balance estimates in response to local environmental conditions. In South Korea, the forest ecosystems cover approximately 64% of the total area, thereby strongly affecting regional carbon balances. Cultivated croplands that cover about 17% of the total area should also be considered when calculating the carbon balance of the country. In this study, our objectives were (a) to quantify the range and seasonal variation of NEE at forest ecosystems, including deciduous, coniferous, and mixed forests, and agricultural ecosystems, including rice paddies and a potato field, in South Korea and (b) to compare NEE at ten Fluxnet sites that have the same or similar ecosystems as found in South Korea. The results showed that the forest and agricultural ecosystems were carbon sinks. In Korea, NEE at the forest ecosystems varied between -31 and $-362gC/m^2/yr$, and NEE at the croplands ranged from -210 to $-248gC/m^2/growing$ season. At the deciduous forest, NEE reached low values in late spring, early summer, and early autumn, while at the coniferous forest, it reached low values in spring, early summer, and mid autumn. The young mixed forest was a much stronger carbon sink than the old-growth deciduous and coniferous forests. During each crop growing season, beet had the lowest NEE value within six crops, followed by wither wheat, maize, rice, potato, and soybean. These results will be useful for designing and applying management strategies for the reduction of $CO_2$ emissions.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.124-138
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• 2018

This research was conducted to examine the availability of spatial data for assessing absorption rates of $CO_2$ in the forest of Ansan-si and evaluate the validity of methods that analyze $CO_2$ absorption. To statistically assess the $CO_2$ absorption rates per year, the 1:5,000 Digital Forest-Map (Lim5000) and Standard Carbon Removal of Major Forest Species (SCRMF) methods were employed. Furthermore, Land Cover Map (LCM) was also used to verify $CO_2$ absorption rate availability per year. Great variations in $CO_2$ absorption rates occurred before and after the year 2010. This was due to improvement in precision and accuracy of the Forest Basic Statistics (FBS) in 2010, which resulted in rapid increase in growing stock. Thus, calibration of data prior to 2010 is necessary, based on recent FBS standards. Previous studies that employed Lim5000 and FBS (2015, 2010) did not take into account the $CO_2$ absorption rates of different tree species, and the combination of SCRMF and Lim5000 resulted in $CO_2$ absorption of 42,369 ton. In contrast to the combination of SCRMF and Lim5000, LCM and SCRMF resulted in $CO_2$ absorption of 40,696 ton. Homoscedasticity tests for Lim5000 and LCM resulted in p-value <0.01, with a difference in $CO_2$ absorption of 1,673 ton. Given that $CO_2$ absorption in forests is an important factor that reduces greenhouse gas emissions, the findings of this study should provide fundamental information for supporting a wide range of decision-making processes for land use and management.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.102 no.1
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• pp.82-89
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• 2013

Harvest is one of the major disturbances affecting the soil carbon (C) dynamics in forests. However, researches on the long-term impact of periodic harvest on the soil C dynamics are limited since they requires rigorous control of various factors. Therefore, we adopted a modeling approach to determine the long-term impacts of harvest interval, harvest intensity and post-harvest residue management on soil C dynamics by using the Korean Forest Soil Carbon model (KFSC model). The simulation was conducted on Pinus densiflora S. et Z. stands in central Korea, and twelve harvest scenarios were tested by altering harvest intervals (50, 80, and 100-year interval), intensities (partial-cut harvest: 30% and clear-cut harvest: 100% of stand volume), and the residue managements after harvest (collection: 0% and retention: 100% of aboveground residue). We simulated the soil carbon stock for 400 years for each scenario. As a result, the soil C stocks in depth of 30 cm after 400 years range from 50.3 to 55.8 Mg C $ha^{-1}$, corresponding to 98.1 to 108.9% of the C stock at present. The soil C stock under the scenarios with residue retention was 2.5-11.0% higher than that under scenarios with residue collection. However, there was no significant impact of harvest interval and intensity on the soil C stock. The soil C dynamics depended on the dead organic matter dynamics derived from the amount of dead organic matter and growth pattern after harvest.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.209-221
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to analyze the effects of climate change on the nonpoint source pollution in a small watershed using a mid-range model. The study area is a basin in a rural area that covers 384 ha with a composition of 50% forest and 19% paddy. The hydrologic and water quality data were monitored from 1996 to 2004, and the feasibility of the GWLF (Generalized Watershed Loading function) model was examined in the agricultural small watershed using the data obtained from the study area. As one of the studies on climate change, KEI (Korea Environment Institute) has presented the monthly variation ratio of rainfall in Korea based on the climate change scenario for rainfall and temperature. These values and observed daily rainfall data of forty-one years from 1964 to 2004 in Suwon were used to generate daily weather data using the stochastic weather generator model (WGEN). Stream runoff was calibrated by the data of $1996{\sim}1999$ and was verified in $2002{\sim}2004$. The results were determination coeff, ($R^2$) of $0.70{\sim}0.91$ and root mean square error (RMSE) of $2.11{\sim}5.71$. Water quality simulation for SS, TN and TP showed $R^2$ values of 0.58, 0.47 and 0.62, respectively, The results for the impact of climate change on nonpoint source pollution show that if the factors of watershed are maintained as in the present circumstances, pollutant TN loads and TP would be expected to increase remarkably for the rainy season in the next fifty years.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.156-164
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• 2015

High temperature stress would affect rice production in the future as heat wave is expected to occur frequently under climate change conditions. The objective of this study was to obtain rudimentary information to assess the impact of heat stress on rice yield and its yield component in Korea. Two rice cultivars "Hwaseongbyeo" (Japonica) and "Dasanbyeo" (Tongil-type) were grown at different nitrogen fertilization levels in two seasons. These cultivars were grown in 1/5000a Wagner pot placed within four plastic houses where temperature was controlled at ambient, ambient$+1.5^{\circ}C$, ambient$+3^{\circ}C$ and ambient$+5^{\circ}C$ throughout the rice growing season in Suwon ($37^{\circ}16^{\prime}N$, $128^{\circ}59^{\prime}E$), Korea. The degree of temperature change affected grain yield whereas the level of nitrogen had little impact on grain yield. The number of panicle per pot and spikelet per panicle were not significantly different among temperature treatments in both cultivars tested. In contrast, 1000-grain weight and ripened grain ratio were decreased significantly under the treatments raising the air temperature to the level of $5.0^{\circ}C$ and $1.5^{\circ}C$ above the ambient air temperature in Dasanbyeo and Hwaseongbyeo, respectively. Reduction of 1000-grain weight and ripened grain ratio under the temperature treatments of $3.0^{\circ}C$ and $5.0^{\circ}C$ above the ambient air temperature resulted in significantly less grain yield for Dasanbyeo and Hwaseongbyeo, respectively. The greater sensitivity of grain yield to temperature increase in Dasanbyeo was attributable to the sharp decrease of 1000-grain weight and ripened grain ratio with the temperature rise above $23^{\circ}C$ during ripening period. On the other hand, Hwaseongbyeo had little variation of them in the temperature range of $23-27^{\circ}C$. These results suggested that grain yield would decrease under future climate conditions due to grain weight decreased by shorter grain filling period as well as the ripened grain ratio reduced by spikelet sterility and early abortion of rice kernel development. Thus, it would be essential to use cultivars tolerant to heat stress for climate change adaptation, which merits further studies for developing varieties that have traits to avoid spikelet sterility and early abortion of rice kernel, e.g., early morning flowering, under heat wave.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.105-130
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• 2008

Consumers of e-learning market differ from those of other markets in that they are replaced in a specific time scale. For example, e-learning contents aimed at highschool senior students cannot be consumed by a specific consumer over the designated period of time. Hence e-learning service providers need to attract new groups of students every year. Due to lack of information on products designed for continuously emerging consumers, the consumers face difficulties in making rational decisions in a short time period. Increased uncertainty of product purchase leads customers to herding behaviors to obtain information of the product from others and imitate them. Taking into consideration of these features of e-learning market, this study will focus on the online herding behavior in purchasing e-learning contents. There is no definite concept for e-learning. However, it is being discussed in a wide range of perspectives from educational engineering to management to e-business etc. Based upon the existing studies, we identify two main view-points regarding e-learning. The first defines e-learning as a concept that includes existing terminologies, such as CBT (Computer Based Training), WBT (Web Based Training), and IBT (Internet Based Training). In this view, e-learning utilizes IT in order to support professors and a part of or entire education systems. In the second perspective, e-learning is defined as the usage of Internet technology to deliver diverse intelligence and achievement enhancing solutions. In other words, only the educations that are done through the Internet and network can be classified as e-learning. We take the second definition of e-learning for our working definition. The main goal of this study is to investigate what factors affect consumer intention to purchase e-learning contents and to identify the differential impact of the factors between consumers with purchase experience and those without the experience. To accomplish the goal of this study, it focuses on herding behavior and perceived usefulness as antecedents to behavioral intention. The proposed research model in the study extends the Technology Acceptance Model by adding herding behavior and usability to take into account the unique characteristics of e-learning content market and e-learning systems use, respectively. The current study also includes consumer experience with e-learning content purchase because the previous experience is believed to affect purchasing intention when consumers buy experience goods or services. Previous studies on e-learning did not consider the characteristics of e-learning contents market and the differential impact of consumer experience on the relationship between the antecedents and behavioral intention, which is the target of this study. This study employs a survey method to empirically test the proposed research model. A survey questionnaire was developed and distributed to 629 informants. 528 responses were collected, which consist of potential customer group (n = 133) and experienced customer group (n = 395). The data were analyzed using PLS method, a structural equation modeling method. Overall, both herding behavior and perceived usefulness influence consumer intention to purchase e-learning contents. In detail, in the case of potential customer group, herding behavior has stronger effect on purchase intention than does perceived usefulness. However, in the case of shopping-experienced customer group, perceived usefulness has stronger effect than does herding behavior. In sum, the results of the analysis show that with regard to purchasing experience, perceived usefulness and herding behavior had differential effects upon the purchase of e-learning contents. As a follow-up analysis, the interaction effects of the number of purchase transaction and herding behavior/perceived usefulness on purchase intention were investigated. The results show that there are no interaction effects. This study contributes to the literature in a couple of ways. From a theoretical perspective, this study examined and showed evidence that the characteristics of e-learning market such as continuous renewal of consumers and thus high uncertainty and individual experiences are important factors to be considered when the purchase intention of e-learning content is studied. This study can be used as a basis for future studies on e-learning success. From a practical perspective, this study provides several important implications on what types of marketing strategies e-learning companies need to build. The bottom lines of these strategies include target group attraction, word-of-mouth management, enhancement of web site usability quality, etc. The limitations of this study are also discussed for future studies.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.379-392
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• 2014

This study was performed to predict the future climate envelope of Pinus pumila, a subalpine plant and a Climate-sensitive Biological Indicator Species (CBIS) of Korea. P. pumila is distributed at Mt. seorak in South Korea. Suitable habitat were predicted under two alternative RCPscenarios (IPCC AR5). The SDM used for future prediction was a Maxent model, and the total number of environmental variables for Maxent was 8. It was found that the distribution range of P. pumila in the South Korean was $38^{\circ}7^{\prime}8^{{\prime}{\prime}}N{\sim}38^{\circ}7^{\prime}14^{{\prime}{\prime}}N$ and $128^{\circ}28^{\prime}2^{{\prime}{\prime}}E{\sim}128^{\circ}27^{\prime}38^{{\prime}{\prime}}E$ and 1,586m~1,688m in altitude. The variables that contribute the most to define the climate envelope are altitude. Climate envelope simulation accuracy was evaluated using the ROC's AUC. The P. pumila model's 5-cv AUC was found to be 0.99966. which showed that model accuracy was very high. Under both the RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 scenarios, the climate envelope for P. pumila is predicted to decrease in South Korea. According to the results of the maxent model has been applied in the current climate, suitable habitat is $790.78km^2$. The suitable habitats, are distributed in the region of over 1,400m. Further, in comparison with the suitable habitat of applying RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 suitable habitat current, reduction of area RCP8.5 was greater than RCP4.5. Thus, climate change will affect the distribution of P. pumila. Therefore, governmental measures to conserve this species will be necessary. Additionally, for CBIS vulnerability analysis and studies using sampling techniques to monitor areas based on the outcomes of this study, future study designs should incorporate the use of climatic predictions derived from multiple GCMs, especially GCMs that were not the one used in this study. Furthermore, if environmental variables directly relevant to CBIS distribution other than climate variables, such as the Bioclim parameters, are ever identified, more accurate prediction than in this study will be possible.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.26-36
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• 2020

This study aimed at investigating present research and knowledge-base on climate change adaptation in ecosystem sector and analyzed the current status of basic information on ecosystem that functions as evidence-base of climate change adaptation to deduce the suggestions for the future development for knowledge and information in biodiversity. In this perspective, a questionary survey titled as "the ecological knowledge-base and information needs for climate change adaptation" with the researchers who were engaged with adaptation studies for biodiversity in the ecosystem related-research institutes including national and 17 regional local governments-affiliated agencies in Korea. The results are as follows; current status of utilizing ecological information which supports climate change adaptation strategy, future needs for adaptation knowledge and ecological information, and activation of utilizing ecological information. The majority of respondents (90.7%) replied that the ecological information has high relevance when conducting research on climate change adaptation. However, only half of all respondents (53.2%) agreed with the real viability of current information to the adaptation research. Particularly, urgent priority for researchers was deduced as intensifying knowledge-base and constructing related information on 'ecosystem change from climate change (productivity, community structure, food chain, phenology, range distribution, and number of individuals) with the overall improvement of information contents and its quality. The respondents emphasized with the necessity of conducting field surveys of local ecosystem and constructing ecosystem inventories, advancing monitoring designs for climate change in ecosystem, and case studies for regional ecosystem changes with the guidance or guidelines for monitoring ecosystem change to enhance the quality of adaptation research and produce related information. In terms of activation for ecological information usage, national and local adaptation network should be working based on the integrated ecological platform necessary to support exchanges of knowledge and information and to expand ecosystem types in time and spatial dimension.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.195-205
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• 2013

Excessive input of organic matters from fish cage farming has been considered as one of the major factors disturbing benthic ecosystem, especially in semi-enclosed coastal waters. Recently offshore aquaculture in the vicinity of Jeju-do has been introduced to minimize that kind of negative impact. This study was conducted to investigate the ecological impacts of offshore aquaculture on the macrobenthic polychaete communities. A total of ten sampling works were carried out for 28 months, spanning from 10 days after starting giving feed to 3 months after stopping giving feed. During the study period, mean current velocity was quite strong with the range of 50 cm/s to 70 cm/s. TOC of surface sediment was constantly low. Significant changes in polychaete community were detected just three months after starting giving feed, which were the increase of the number of species and density at all stations. Up to 18 months after the start of farming, the amount of feed provided played an important role in the fluctuation of the number of species and density, especially at 0 m and 10 m stations. After reducing the amount of feed provided, dominance of some opportunistic species within 10 m distance from fish cages still lasted to the end of aquaculture. However, opportunistic species disappeared 3 months after the end of farming, which indicated the sign of recovery from the disturbance. From these results, the amount of food input and the period of cultivation were critical factors disturbing polychaete community and ensuing changes in this offshore and oligotrophic waters as well. In addition, study on the changes of polychaete community structure before and after fish farming showed more detailed changes in benthic ecological state than geochemical approach did.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.635-646
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• 2018

This study sought to identify the characteristics of seasonal concentration differences of particulate matter influenced by land cover types associated with particulate matter emission and reductions, namely forest and urbanized regions. PM10 and PM2.5 was measured with quantitative concentration in 2016 on 23 urban air monitoring stations in Seoul, classified the stations into 3 groups based on the ratio of urbanized and forest land covers within a range of 3km around station, and analysed the differences in particulate matter concentration by season. The center values for the urbanized and forest land covers by group were 53.4% and 34.6% in Group A, 61.8% and 16.5% in Group B, and 76.3% and 6.7% in Group C. The group-specific concentration of PM10 and PM2.5 by season indicated that the concentration of Group A, with high ratio of forests, was the lowest in all seasons, and the concentration of Group C, with high ratio of urbanized regions, had the highest concentration from spring to autumn. These inter-group differences were statistically significant. The concentration of Group C was lower than Group B in the winter; however, the differences between Groups B to C in the winter were not statistically significant. Group A concentration compared to the high-concentration groups by season was lower by 8.5%, 11.2%, 8.0%, 6.8% for PM10 in the order of spring, summer, autumn and winter, and 3.5%, 10.0%, 4.1% and 3.3% for PM2.5. The inter-group concentration differences for both PM10 and PM2.5 were the highest in the summer and grew smaller in the winter, this was thought to be because the forests' ability to reduce particulate matter emissions was the most pronounced during the summer and the least pronounced during the winter. The influence of urbanized areas on particulate matter concentration was lower compared to the influence of forests. This study provided evidence that the particulate matter concentration was lower for regions with higher ratios of forests, and subsequent studies are required to identify the role of green space to manage particulate matter concentration in cities.