Five Year Trends of Particulate Matter Concentrations in Korean Regions (2015–2019): When to Ventilate?

Dohyeong Kim, Hee-Eun Choi, Won-Mo Gal and SungChul Seo
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Dohyeong Kim: School of Economic, Political and Policy Sciences, The University of Texas at Dallas, 800 W Campbell Road, Richardson, TX 75080, USA
Hee-Eun Choi: Department of Environmental Health and Safety, College of Health Industry, Eulji University, Seongnam 13135, Korea
Won-Mo Gal: Department of Environmental Health and Safety, College of Health Industry, Eulji University, Seongnam 13135, Korea
SungChul Seo: Department of Environmental Health and Safety, College of Health Industry, Eulji University, Seongnam 13135, Korea

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 16, 1-15

Abstract: Indoor air quality becomes more critical as people stay indoors longer, particularly children and the elderly who are vulnerable to air pollution. Natural ventilation has been recognized as the most economical and effective means of improving indoor air quality, but its benefit is questionable when the external air quality is unacceptable. Such risk-risk tradeoffs would require evidence-based guidelines for households and policymakers, but there is a lack of research that examines spatiotemporal long-term air quality trends, leaving us unclear on when to ventilate. This study aims to suggest the appropriate time for ventilation by analyzing the hourly and quarterly concentrations of particulate matter (PM)10 and PM2.5 in seven metropolitan cities and Jeju island in South Korea from January 2015 to September 2019. Both areas’ PM levels decreased until 2018 and rebounded in 2019 but are consistently higher in spring and winter. Overall, the average concentrations of PM10 and PM2.5 peaked in the morning, declined in the afternoon, and rebounded in the evening, but the second peak was more pronounced for PM2.5. This study may suggest ventilation in the afternoon (2–6pm) instead of the morning or late evening, but substantial differences across the regions by season encourage intervention strategies tailored to regional characteristics.

Keywords: particulate matter; natural ventilation; indoor air quality; regional variation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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