"Let's Reduce Roadside Fine Dust"... Ministry of Environment Strengthens Winter Cleaning Vehicle Operations

Asia Economy DB=Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Bo-kyung] The Ministry of Environment will expand the designation of intensive management roads and strengthen the operation of road cleaning vehicles from next month until March of next year to reduce road dust resuspension.

This measure is being implemented as part of the joint "Second Implementation Plan for the Seasonal Fine Dust Management System" by related ministries, deliberated and approved by the Special Committee on Fine Dust Countermeasures.

Road dust resuspension refers to dust that accumulates on roads and is stirred up by vehicle movement. As of 2017, it accounts for about 8% (7,515 tons) of the total nationwide fine particulate matter emissions of 91,731 tons.

Intensive management roads are selected considering factors such as the population exposed to road fine dust and vehicle traffic volume. This year, an additional 214 km have been designated compared to last year, totaling 387 sections nationwide, covering 1,946 km.

Each local government will increase cleaning of intensive management roads from once a day to twice or more during the seasonal fine dust management period from December to March of next year.

Road cleaning uses high-pressure water trucks, vacuum road surface vehicles, and dust suction vehicles. However, water cleaning is not performed when the temperature is below 5℃ due to the risk of road icing.

In addition, major dust sources such as construction sites near roads are identified to verify whether appropriate measures have been taken to suppress dust generation, and dust that could enter the roads is cleaned in advance.

The Korea Environment Corporation plans to use mobile measurement vehicles for road fine dust to check the status of fine dust removal on intensive management roads and will disclose the results on the mobile measurement system website.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.