The evolution of the ecological footprint and its relationship with the urban development of megacities in Western China: The case of Xi'an.

Although China's western cities have developed rapidly in recent years, their ecosystems remain fragile. The conflict between urban development and environmental protection must be resolved to achieve the goal of sustainability. This study examines Xi'an as a case study of a megacity in Western China, calculating the city development index (CDI) and per capita ecological footprint (ef) from 2005 to 2016 to comprehensively calculate Xi'an's eco-efficiency. The E-C elasticity coefficient, which refers to the ratio of the rate of change in CDI to the rate of change in ef, is proposed to characterize the degree to which urban development responds to changes in the ef. The CDI and ef both showed an upward trend from 2005 to 2016. Xi'an's environmental efficiency has grown rapidly, and resource efficiency is the main factor driving its fluctuations in eco-efficiency. The energy consumption and pollution emissions are highly correlated with the CDI, and they are the main factors affecting the development of Xi'an. The relationship between CDI and ef is consistent with the law of diminishing marginal utility, the level of urban development rises and then decreases with the increase in ef.

[1]  Huang Tie.  Primary Research on Assessment of Sustainable Development , 2002 .

[2]  Marco Casazza,et al.  Enhancing the Sustainability Narrative through a Deeper Understanding of Sustainable Development Indicators , 2017 .

[3]  Andreas Sturm,et al.  Ökologische Rationalität: Ansatzpunkte zur Ausgestaltung von ökologieorientierten Managementinstrumenten , 1990 .

[4]  William E. Rees,et al.  Ecological footprints and appropriated carrying capacity: what urban economics leaves out , 1992 .

[5]  B. Clapp.  Environmental History of Britain since the Industrial Revolution, An , 1994 .

[6]  D. Shaw.  Human development report, 1990 : UNDP ix + 189 pages, £9.95, (New York and Oxford, Oxford University Press for UNDP, 1990)☆ , 1991 .

[7]  Mathis Wackernagel,et al.  Natural capital accounting with the ecological footprint concept , 1999 .

[8]  Guijian Liu,et al.  Ecological footprint of Rawalpindi; Pakistan's first footprint analysis from urbanization perspective , 2018 .

[9]  Kevin Lo,et al.  Measuring sustainable urbanization in China: a case study of the coastal Liaoning area , 2013, Sustainability Science.

[10]  Zhaohua Wang,et al.  Assessment and prediction of environmental sustainability in China based on a modified ecological footprint model , 2017 .

[11]  Renzhong Guo,et al.  Ecological control line: A decade of exploration and an innovative path of ecological land management for megacities in China. , 2017, Journal of environmental management.

[12]  Valentinas Podvezko,et al.  Multiple criteria analysis of environmental sustainability and quality of life in post-Soviet states , 2018, Ecological Indicators.

[13]  D. Blahna,et al.  Environmental stewardship footprint research: linking human agency and ecosystem health in the Puget Sound region , 2013, Urban Ecosystems.

[14]  E. Verhofstadt,et al.  Linking individuals' ecological footprint to their subjective well-being , 2016 .

[15]  Helmut Yabar,et al.  Sustainability assessment with time-series scores: a case study of Chinese provinces , 2009 .

[16]  Shenghui Cui,et al.  An eco-efficiency-based urban sustainability assessment method and its application , 2010 .

[17]  J. Bi,et al.  Eco-efficiency analysis of industrial system in China: A data envelopment analysis approach , 2008 .

[18]  张欢 Zhang Huan,et al.  An Evaluation Index System for Ecological Civilization Construction in Megacities and its Research Applications: The Case of Wuhan City , 2015 .

[19]  Yan-ju Liu,et al.  Preliminary Strategic Environmental Assessment of the Great Western Development Strategy: Safeguarding Ecological Security for a New Western China , 2011, Environmental Management.

[20]  Jianguo Wu,et al.  Assessing urban sustainability of Chinese megacities: 35 years after the economic reform and open-door policy , 2016 .