Abstract
Precipitation samples were collected by the wet-only sampling method in Iksan in the northwest of Chonbuk from March 1995 to February 1997. These samples were analyzed for the concentration of ion components, in addition to pH and electrical conductivity. The annual mean pH of precipitation was 4.8 and the seasonal trend of pH was shown to be low in Fall and Winter(4.5), middle-ranged in Spring(4.7) and high in Summer(5.0). The frequency of pH below 5.6 was about 71%. The seasonal pattern of pH frequency was found to be different in each season. In the case of the pH less than 5.0, the frequency was higher in Spring, Fall and Winter than in Summer, especially higher in Fall than in other seasons. The concentrations of analysed ions showed a pronounced seasonal pattern. However, major ion species for all seasons were $NH^+_4,;Ca^{2+};and;Na^+$ among cations and $SO^{2-}_4,;Cl^-;and;NO^-_3$ among anions. The major acidifying species appeared to be $nss-SO^{2-}_4;and;NO^-_3$, and the main bases responsible for the neutralization of precipitation acidity were $nss-Ca^{2+};and;NH^+_4$. The potential acidity of precipitation, pAi, was found to be between 3.0 and 5.0 for total samples, while the measured pH was approximately between 3.9 and 7.8. The seasonal trend of pAi showed a decreasing order: Summer (4.3), Winter(4.0), Spring and Fall(3.8). During the Fall, both pAi and pH were especially very low, which indicated that during this period the potential acidity of precipitation was high but the neutralizing capacity was low. For Spring, pAi was very low but pH was slightly high. This was likely due to the large amount of $CaCO_3$ in the soil particles transported over a long range from the Chinese continent that were incorporated into the precipitation, and then neutralized the acidifying species with its high concentraton.
