• The Journal of Engineering Geology
• /
• v.28 no.2
• /
• pp.217-246
• /
• 2018

During the selection and characterization of target formations in the Small-scale Offshore $CO_2$ Storage Demonstration Project in the Pohang Basin, we have carefully investigated the possibility of induced earthquakes and leakage of $CO_2$ during the injection, and have designed the storage processes to minimize these effects. However, people in Pohang city have a great concern on $CO_2$-injection-intrigued seismicity, since they have greatly suffered from the 5.4 magnitude earthquake on Nov. 15, 2017. The research team of the project performed an extensive self-investigation on the safety issues, especially on the possible $CO_2$ leakage from the target formation and induced earthquakes. The target formation is 10 km apart from the epicenter of the Pohang earthquake and the depth is also quite shallow, only 750 to 800 m from the sea bottom. The project performed a pilot injection in the target formation from Jan. 12 to Mar. 12, 2017, which implies that there are no direct correlation of the Pohang earthquake on Nov. 15, 2017. In addition, the $CO_2$ injection of the storage project does not fracture rock formations, instead, the supercritical $CO_2$ fluid replaces formation water in the pore space gradually. The self-investigation results show that there is almost no chance for the injection to induce significant earthquakes unless injection lasts for a very long time to build a very high pore pressure, which can be easily monitored. The amount of injected $CO_2$ in the project was around 100 metric-tonne that is irrelevant to the Pohang earthquake. The investigation result on long-term safety also shows that the induced earthquakes or the reactivation of existing faults can be prevented successfully when the injection pressure is controlled not to demage cap-rock formation nor exceed Coulomb stresses of existing faults. The project has been performing extensive studies on critical stress for fracturing neighboring formations, reactivation stress of existing faults, well-completion processes to minimize possible leakage, transport/leakage monitoring of injected $CO_2$, and operation procedures for ensuring the storage safety. These extensive studies showed that there will be little chance in $CO_2$ leakage that affects human life. In conclusion, the Small-scale Offshore $CO_2$ Storage Demonstration Project in the Pohang Basin would not cause any induced earthquakes nor signifiant $CO_2$ leakage that people can sense. The research team will give every effort to secure the safety of the storage site.

• Journal of Animal Environmental Science
• /
• v.17 no.2
• /
• pp.71-80
• /
• 2011

Trickling filter has been extensively studied for the domestic wastewater treatment especially for the small scale plants in rural area. The purpose of this research is to survey the physical and microbial characteristics of wood chip media and the removal efficiency of animal wastewater using wood chip trickling filter system. The trickling filtration system comprises a filtration bed packed with wood chip media having a particle dia. of 5~7cm. The method comprises natural air from the bottom of the bed. The system also comprises a control mechanism including a time a constant discharge pump for controlling supply of the wastewater into the bed. The following conclusions were obtained from the results of this research. 1. The specific surface area of wood chip was 0.4123 $m^2$/g, pore volume was 0.0947 $cm^3$/g, density was 0.49 g/$cm^3$. It has forms of parallelogram and oblong which have numerous small pore space. This wood chip has been good condition for microorganism's habitat, having very larger specific surface area by complex the three dimension structure of cellulose at wood's major ingredients. 2. The total counts of in attached aerobic microbes were ranged from $10^6$ to $10^8$ CFU/g, and anaerobes microbial numbers were from $10^4$ to $10^7$. The aerobic microbial numbers appeared to be much more than those of anaerobic microbial numbers. 3. The average efficiency of $BOD_5$ and CODcr were 74.5% and 51.5%, respectively. The removal efficiency of T-N and T-P were 61.4%, 56.2%, respectively. But SS removal levels remain 19.3%.

• Journal of the Korean Geosynthetics Society
• /
• v.18 no.4
• /
• pp.181-191
• /
• 2019

Most of the reservoirs in South Korea are fill dam, and overflow and piping phenomena have been detected as the main causes of failure of fill dam. In this study, an operating ◯◯ reservoir located in Gongju-si is modeled in centrifuge model test to study the behavior of reservoir during water level rise and overflow conditions. In order to simulate seepage and overflow in the real reservoir, the model was constructed in 1/50 scale, and deteriorated and reinforced conduits were installed. After modeling the reinforced and deteriorated conditions of the conduits, LVDTs, pore pressure gauges were installed and centrifuge model tests were carried out with water level rise and overflow conditions in order to analyze the reservoir behavior according to the reinforcement methods. The results of centrifuge model test in water level rise condition show that deteriorated conduit has adverse effects in the stability of the reservoir body, and the conduit which is reinforced by the inverse lining method has enhanced stability of the reservoir body. Moreover, installation of water spillway is seen to prevent the scour and erosion of the reservoir body. The study provides a basic data required for the reinforcement of conduit and water spillway in the reservoir.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
• /
• v.29 no.3
• /
• pp.289-296
• /
• 2007

Porous media for sewage treatment were developed through a pyrolysis process of food wastes with loess in the study. This work was carried out in two consecutive stages; in the first stage, new porous media were prepared through a high temperature pyrolysis process, and then the resultant media were applied to a simple lab-scale sewage treatment process in the second stage. To determine the optimum operating conditions of pyrolysis and mixing ratio of materials, physical properties such as specific surface area, porosity and compressive strength of final products were analyzed. The removal efficiencies of TOC and COD were measured to evaluate the effectiveness of resultant porous media. As a result of the experiment, we found that the best mixing ratio of food wastes to loess was 1 : 1 at $1,100^{\circ}C$. Average porosity of the developed media was 37.0%, in which pore size ranged from 1 to $20{\mu}m$, showing quite vigorous microbial activation. After immersing the media into a reactor for sewage treatment for eight days, removal efficiencies of TOC and COD were 87.3% and 85.0%, respectively.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
• /
• v.39 no.3
• /
• pp.259-264
• /
• 2002

In this study, sintering properties of Artificial Lightweight aggregates(ALAs) prepared from coal ash as a function of sintering temperature (900$^{\circ}$C, 1000$^{\circ}$C, 1100$^{\circ}$C) and time (2min, 5min, 10min) when limestone added as lightweight mineral was investigated. Increasing the sintering temperature resulted simultaneously from a decline of quartz mineral as well as growth of mullite mineral. Addition of limestone to ALAs newly formed sintered minerals such as clinoptilolite and plagioclase. Sintering effect of ALAs prepared from coal ash and limestone was more affected by a sintering temperature than time. As sintering temperature and time increae, transition of macropore to micropore and formation of closed pores were happened, consequently shrank the total pore volume of ALAs. The surface of ALAs sintered at 1000$^{\circ}$C for 5min was nearly not detected open pores due toe amalgamation effect of molten slag layer but homogeneous distributions of closed pores with micro-scale were examined in cross sectional area ALAs. Sintering temperature and time which present the most adequate state, in the preparation of ALAs, are corresponded to 1000$^{\circ}$C and 5min, respectively.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
• /
• v.18 no.4
• /
• pp.321-326
• /
• 1999

This study was performed to evaluate the quality of produced compost and to analyse the change of a component during the reduction compost according to the input volume. The volume of pilot scale used in this study was about 300㎥. The pile of 2m width, 20m length and 1.2m height was constructed. Woodchip was used as bulking agent to enhance pore volume of composting bay and to control water content of food waste in starting time. Food waste was turned using a mechanical tumer twice a day. The result are as follows : In these cases of input volume of $2m^3$ and $3.5m^3$, temperature of composting pile was maintained over $60^{\circ}C$ and water content was 43.6% and 47.2%, respectively. It was proved that microorganisms activity was maintained high in each input volume. After operation of step 1 and step 2, pH and organic matter in the final compost were 6.2, 6.6 and 84.3%, 79.6%, respectively. Cation concentration such as $K_2O,$ CaO and NaCl was accumulated in the compost during the composting period. NaCl concentration in the final compost was 4.62%, 4.92%, respectively. Hence, If was recommended that this compost should be applied to others expect agricultural area or mixed with a low concentration other compost. In the steps 1, input volume of $2m^3$, heavy metal concentration of Pb, Cu, Cr, Ni. Cd were 37.82㎎/㎏, 56.87㎎/㎏, 9.8㎎/㎏. 22.21㎎/㎏ and 3.69㎎/㎏, and 44.55㎎/㎏, 95.54㎎/㎏, 12.22㎎/㎏, 24.94㎎/㎏, and 3.86㎎/㎏ in the step 2.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
• /
• v.26 no.2
• /
• pp.59-67
• /
• 2016

In this paper, we perform a numerical analysis to evaluate the potential of fault reactivation during gas production from hydrate bearing sediments and the moment magnitude of induced seismicity. For the numerical analysis, sequential coupling of TOUGH+Hydrate and FLAC3D was used and the change in effective stress and consequent geomechanical deformation including fault reactivation was simulated by assuming that Mohr-Coulomb shear resistance criterion is valid. From the test production simulation of 30 days, we showed that pore pressure reduction as well as effective stress change hardly induces the fault reactivation in the vicinity of a production well. We also investigated the influence of stress state conditions to a fault reactivation, and showed that normal fault stress regime, where vertical stress is relatively greater than horizontal, may have the largest potential for the reactivation. We tested one simulation that earthquake can be induced during gas production and calculated the moment magnitude of the seismicity. Our calculation presented that all the magnitudes from the calculation were negative values, which indicates that induced earthquakes can be grouped into micro-seismic and as small as hardly perceived by human beings. However, it should be noted that the current simulation was carried out using the highly simplified geometric model and assumptions such that the further simulations for a scheduled test production and commercial scale production considering complex geometric conditions may produce different results.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
• /
• v.18 no.1
• /
• pp.54-60
• /
• 1999

Three different types of lab-scale anaerobic bioreactors, AF and two-stage ASBF-PR and ASBF-SP, were evaluated in treating swine wastewater by operating at $1{\sim}2$ days of hydraulic retention time with increasing organic loading rate upto 6.3 $kg-COD/m^3{\cdot}d$ at $35^{\circ}C$. Seeding the anaerobic bioreactors with waste anaerobic digester sludge from a municipal wastewater treatment plant was effective and a 40-day acclimation period was required for steady-state operation. Three anaerobic bioreactors were effective in treating swine wastewater with COD removal efficiency of $66.4{\sim}84.9$% and biogas production rate of $0.333{\sim}0.796m^3/kg-COD_{removed}{\cdot}d$. Increases of organic loading rate by increasing influent COD concentration and/or decreasing hydraulic retention time caused decreases in COD removal efficiency and increases in biogas production rate. At relatively high organic loading rate employed in this study, the treatment efficiency of AF and ASBF-PR were similar but superior than that of ASBF-SP, indicating that porosity and pore size of the media packed in the bioreactors are more important factors contributing the performance of to bioreactors than specific surface area of the media. TKN in swine wastewater must be removed prior to the anaerobic processes when anaerobic process is considered as a major treatment process since influent TKN concentration of $1,540{\sim}1,870mg/L$ to the bioreactors adversely affect the activity of methanogenic bacteria, resulting in decreases of treatment efficiency and biogas production rate by 50%.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.33 no.4
• /
• pp.435-445
• /
• 2011

We investigated geochemical properties, and microbial sulfate- and iron(III) reduction in sediment influenced by the aquaculture of abalone in the Nohwa-do, southern coastal sea in Korea. Concentrations of ammonium, phosphate, and sulfide in the pore-water were higher at farm sites than at control sites. The differences between the 2 types of sites were most apparent in terms of the weights of abalone and the temperature increase during September. Accordingly, the rates of sulfate reduction at the farm sites during September (61 mmol S $m^{-2}d{-1}$) were 3-fold higher than the sulfate reduction during May (20 mmol S $m^{-2}d{-1}$). In contrast, Fe(III) reduction rates were highest at the control sites in May, but its significance was relatively decreased at farm sites during September when sulfate reduction rates were highest. During September, benthic ammonium flux was 3-fold greater at the farm sites (35 mmol N $m^{-2}d{-1}$) than at the control sites (12 mmol N $m^{-2}d{-1}$), and phosphate flux was 8-fold higher at the farm sites (0.018 mmol P $m^{-2}d{-1}$) than at control sites (0.003 mmol P $m^{-2}d{-1}$). Overall results indicated that the inappropriate operation of a large-scale aquaculture farm may result in excess input of biodeposits and high nutrient fluxes from the sediment, thereby decreasing diversity of the benthic ecosystem and deepening eutrophication in coastal waters.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
• /
• v.27 no.11
• /
• pp.1168-1173
• /
• 2005

Pilot scale vertical-type membrane bioreactor was operated to examine the effect of $FeCl_3$ injection on the removal of organics, nitrogen and phosphorous, and additionally trans-membrane pressure (TMP) was observed. The membrane type was hollow fiber membrane with pore size of $0.25\;{\mu}m$, and the material was polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE). The membrane permeate was continuously removed by a pump under a constant flux ($25\;L/m^2/h$). Air back-flushing technique were adopted to reduce fouling. As a result, TMP was increased more slowly than that of the operation without air back-flushing, During long-term operation, approximately 310 days, the injection of $FeCl_3$ was effective not only in removing phosphorous chemically but also in reducing TMP increase. Furthermore, while the average COD and T-N concentration of the effluent without $FeCl_3$ injection was 14.3 mg/L and 6.0 mg/L respectively, that of effluent with $FeCl_3$ was 11.3 mg/L and 6.0 mg/L respectively, which confirmed the effects of $FeCl_3$.