Greetings to all the eco-lovers of TUNZA Eco-Generation!

My name is Tae Yeon Kim and it's my honor to serve as the 9th regional ambassador representing : Republic of Korea !
Are you guys all aware of the song "Gangnam Style" sung by Korean singer Psy? If you weren't, be sure to check out the music video on the You Tube, as it is skyrocketing to worldwide fame, currently ranking the 2nd in the Billboard Chart.  As a Korean, I was very exicted when I heard about Psy's global fame, and also very proud thinking that Korea's global image has been enhanced.

However, when I checked the environmental facts and issues regarding our country to write the articles for the Eco-Generation, I realized that there are a lot to do reach the level of fame Psy is enjoying in environmental perspective. The current environmental pollution of Korea is quite severe, which I will inform you on sooner or later. But good thing is that the effort the government and individuals are putting into in environment preservation is catching up the level of pollution. During next several months, I'll try my best to give you a lot of information dealing with these!
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On this article, I'll be covering the issues regarding air pollution of Korea.

A recent research done in collaboration of Yonsei University (one of the top universities in Korea), the Korean national Institute of Environmental Research (NIER) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has clearly proved the severe air pollution currently overwhelming Korea. To understand what they have found out, we first have to know what aerosol is. Aerosol can be defined as a fine solid or liquid particle that floats around the atmosphere. You can determine the severity of air pollution by measuring the thickness of the aerosol layer. 

Their research result showed that the average amount of aerosol in Korea is 0.49, and Seoul a little higher : 0.53 (2.0 is the highest number you could get). This figure is 35% higher than Kyoto in Japan (0.36) and 50% higher than Washington in the United States (0.32).   The NIER suggested that this phenomenon was due to high number of cars compared to the land area of Korea (one car per every 2.74 people) and yellow sand inflow from China. Though it could be argued that China is one of our major contributors to the current air pollution, it is quite certain that we need to step up our own efforts!!!         

Let's discuss these issues further in the next article !    

<Picture from YTN science - The aerosol map : areas of red & green are where aerosol figure is high.>