Source Characteristics of Atmospheric CO2and CH4in a Northeastern Highland Area of South Korea

This study aims to present the atmospheric CO(2)and CH(4)levels and analyze their source characteristics at an observation station in a northeastern highland area of Korea for the 2012-2014 period. We summarized the measured CO(2)and CH(4)concentrations for the 2012-2014 period. In addition, we characterized the major source of the rise of CO(2)and CH(4)in Ganseong (GS) by employing bivariate polar plots (BPP) and the concentration weighted trajectory (CWT) method together with currently available information on emission sources. For the three years, CO(2)was generally high in the order of winter, spring, autumn and summer and CH(4)high in the order of winter, autumn, spring and summer. The observed positive correlations between the hourly CO(2)and CH(4)in every season suggested the possibility of shared common emission sources, but there is a necessity for elucidation on this in the future. The BPP analysis indicated the local sources that are likely to be associated with the rise of greenhouse gases (GHGs) observed at GS (combustion in the village, plant respirations nearby GS, and mobile emissions on the nearby road for CO(2)and leakages from the gas stations along the road and agricultural activities for CH4). Synthesizing the CWT results together with emission source information from national and global emission inventories, we identified likely major source areas and characterized major emission sources. For example, the identified major sources for the winter CO(2)are coal combustion, coal washing and industrial activities in Inner Mongolia, northern and the northeastern China, fuel burning for the energy for the infrastructure of a northwestern city in South Korea, and the manufacturing industry and fuel combustion in the northern parts of North Korea. Hopefully, these kinds of results will aid environmental researchers and decision-makers in performing more in-depth studies for GHG sources in order to derive effective mitigation strategies.