In this study, the fundamental aspects governing the environmental behavior of nitrogen oxides were explored from two air quality-monitoring stations (AQM) in Seoul, Korea, over an 11-year period (1996-2006). The two stations were selected to represent an urban roadside (U-RS) and urban background station (U-BG). The mean concentration levels of NO_x at the U-RS area exhibited a gradual decrease through years (from ～290 ppb (1996) to 100ppb (2003)), while those measured at the U-BG site maintained fairly stable values (～70 ppb) throughout the years. The mean concentration levels of NO and NO_2 at the U-BG site were almost the same (～35ppb), while the U-RS site showed that the mean value of NO (～ 127 ppb) is significantly higher than that of NO_2 (～60ppb). The observation of larger differences in NO level between the two sites reflects the direct impact of vehicular emissions at the U-RS site. Both correlation and factor analyses were conducted between the hourly data sets of NO_x species (N = ～90,000) and relevant environmental variables for both the sites. The results of both tests confirm the prominent role of vehicular activities in determining the level of nitrogen oxides at urban roadside environments, although such effects appear to be rather intricate at U-BG. Our comparative analysis of NO_x data sets collected over varying temporal scales indicate that their distributions in the urban environment can be distinguished more clearly in spatial factors (i.e., between urban background and urban roadside) than other criteria.
展开▼
