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Reverberating Beyond the Region in Addressing Air Pollution in North-East Asia . Sangmin NAM and Heejoo LEE UNESCAP Subregional Office for East and North-East Asia. Regional Environmental Governance.
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Reverberating Beyond the Region in Addressing Air Pollution in North-East Asia Sangmin NAM and Heejoo LEE UNESCAP Subregional Office for East and North-East Asia
Regional Environmental Governance Ecological Interdependence: geographical proximity, climatic contiguity and ecological interconnections Environmental Governance Mutual Vulnerability Common pool resources Shared environmental resources
(Sub)regional Environmental Governance in Asia and the Pacific
Formal Mechanisms for REG in NEA Mechanisms for Comprehensive Cooperation • NEASPEC (Northeast Asian Subregional Program for Environmental Cooperation) established in 1993, 6 countries • NEAC (Northeast Asian Conference on Environmental Cooperation) established in 1992, 5 countries (now discontinued) • TEMM (Tripartite Environment Ministers Meeting) in 1999, 3 countries Mechanisms for Governing the Commons • NOWPAP (Northwest Pacific Action Plan) in 1994, 4 countries • EANET (Acid Deposition Monitoring Network in East Asia) in 1998, 13 countries • LTP (Joint Research Project on Long Range Air Pollutants) in 1995, 3 countries • East Asian Biosphere Reserve Network (EABRN) in 1994, 6 countries
Acid Deposition Monitoring Network in East Asia (EANET) Goal: reduce environmental impacts by acid deposition Membership: covering 13 countries with 54 monitoring sites
Long-range Transboundary Pollution (LTP) 1995-99 • Establishing institutional foundation • International cooperation for improving air quality in Northeast Asia • Establish a foundation for joint research • Establish database on the concentration and emissions of air pollutants • Establish a modeling system 1st stage (’00~’04) • Estimate emissions among three countries • Research on monitoring and modeling • Produce S-R relationships among countries 2nd stage (’05~’07) • Research on the impacts of NOx, O3, and PM 3rd stage (’08~’12) Source: Lim-Seok, Chang (2011), Modeling results from LTP project
Modeling S-R Relationship • Point source • Socioeconomic data • Emission factors measurements Emission Inventory Modeling Critical Load Multi-models Uncertainties in Emission Domestic and Regional Control Policy Long Term Monitoring Concentration of Gaseous and Aerosol Concentration and Deposition Source-Receptor Relationship Intensive Monitoring Concentrations and Physical and Chemical Characteristics of Aerosol • Satellite • Airplane • Ship • Surface
Monitoring Long-range Transport of Air Pollution Monitoring Stations of LTP
Implication of Modeling and Monitoring • Value disparity exists among countries but significantly narrowed • Not interference by politics in computing given data but in advancing overall modeling exercise • scientific shortcomings in taking account of various factors (seasonal variations, microclimatic conditions, nonlinear chemical reactions, etc) Technical measures • Updated data with better quality • Expanding data sharing with expansion of monitoring stations • Expanding chemical species (O3, PM2.5, VOCs, POPs, etc)
Implication in institutional context • Conflicting national interests among initiators of each mechanism, and between source and receptor countries • Limited model comparison work and policy linkage • Limited participation of academic community, thereby weak epistemic community
NEA Atmospheric Governance: reverberate beyond the region • Harnessing benefits of knowledge and experiences from other regions to strengthen consensual knowledge
NEA Atmospheric Governance: reverberate beyond the region • Identifying NEA’s linkages with emerging issues including Short-lived Climate Forcers (SLCF) including black carbon, methane, HFCs and tropospheric ozone • BC emissions: China: 1.5 million tons (CMA), Europe: 0.8 million tons (IIASA) • LTP and EANET: No related programme yet Collaboration • CLRTAP: TF HTAP and Expert Group on Black Carbon