Water-environmental risk assessment of the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei collaborative development region in China

ABSTRACT With the rapid development of social and economic conditions in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei (BTH) collaborative development region in China, the water-environmental problems gradually evolve into a regional problem. As an important tool of predicting and preventing these problems, water-environmental risk assessment (WERA) plays an increasingly important role in environment management. This study mainly targets the surface water environment and takes the BTH region as a study area in developing a water-environmental risk assessment index system based on the Driving force-Pressures-States-Impacts-Responses model. The weighting, risk, and zoning of each index are determined using multiple methods such as the Analytic Hierarchy Process, fuzzy comprehensive evaluation, and geographic information system technology. Further discussions are made to analyze the leading factors of high-risk units, the relationship between the risk level and social economy, and the uncertainty of WERA. Generally speaking, results show that the relative high-risk areas mainly distribute in Beijing, Tianjin, Shijiazhuang, and Tangshan, and the relative low-risk areas mainly distribute in Chengde and Zhangjiakou. The remaining parts of the region are at the middle-risk level. The results also show a positive correlation between the risk level and the social economy. This study gathered lots of data and carried out a number of calculation work, and is expected to improve the WERA methods and help managers set the priorities for local water-environmental management and make more effective decisions in the context of BTH collaborative development.

[1]  Xiangzheng Deng,et al.  Impacts of economic development on ecosystem risk in the Yellow River Delta , 2011 .

[2]  J. Goffart,et al.  Consequential environmental life cycle assessment of a farm-scale biogas plant. , 2016, Journal of environmental management.

[3]  Biswajeet Pradhan,et al.  Groundwater vulnerability assessment using an improved DRASTIC method in GIS , 2014 .

[4]  Hubert Wiggering,et al.  Indicating ecosystem integrity — theoretical concepts and environmental requirements , 2000 .

[5]  M. Kumar,et al.  Status of wetlands in India: A review of extent, ecosystem benefits, threats and management strategies , 2014 .

[6]  Ling Yao,et al.  Indicators for Environment Health Risk Assessment in the Jiangsu Province of China , 2015, International journal of environmental research and public health.

[7]  Martin O'Connor,et al.  An analysis of risks for biodiversity under the DPSIR framework , 2009 .

[8]  B. Morton,et al.  An integrated environmental risk assessment and management framework for enhancing the sustainability of marine protected areas: the Cape d'Aguilar Marine Reserve case study in Hong Kong. , 2015, The Science of the total environment.

[9]  Xiaoyan Dai,et al.  Assessment and zoning of eco-environmental sensitivity for a typical developing province in China , 2012, Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment.

[10]  G. Yuan,et al.  Environmental geochemical mapping and multivariate geostatistical analysis of heavy metals in topsoils of a closed steel smelter: Capital Iron & Steel Factory, Beijing, China , 2013 .

[11]  F. Nejadkoorki,et al.  Using the RESRAD Code to Assess Human Exposure Risk to 226Ra, 232Th, and 40K in Soil , 2015 .

[12]  João Carlos Marques,et al.  Towards a DPSIR driven integration of ecological value, water uses and ecosystem services for estuarine systems , 2013 .

[13]  Linyu Xu,et al.  The study of a method of regional environmental risk assessment. , 2009, Journal of environmental management.

[14]  Rehan Sadiq,et al.  Risk-based environmental decision-making using fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (F-AHP) , 2006 .

[15]  Yingxia Li,et al.  Current Progress of Environmental Risk Assessment Research , 2012 .

[16]  F. Müller,et al.  Socioeconomic influences on biodiversity, ecosystem services and human well-being: a quantitative application of the DPSIR model in Jiangsu, China. , 2014, The Science of the total environment.

[17]  Raffaele Giordano,et al.  A fuzzy knowledge-based decision support system for groundwater pollution risk evaluation. , 2004, Journal of environmental management.

[18]  R. Weterings,et al.  Environmental indicators: Typology and overview , 1999 .

[19]  Daniel Oesterwind,et al.  Drivers and pressures - Untangling the terms commonly used in marine science and policy. , 2016, Journal of environmental management.

[20]  C. E. SHANNON,et al.  A mathematical theory of communication , 1948, MOCO.

[21]  J. Juanes,et al.  Environmental risk assessment of water quality in harbor areas: a new methodology applied to European ports. , 2015, Journal of environmental management.

[22]  Christian K. Feld,et al.  Indicators for biodiversity and ecosystem services: towards an improved framework for ecosystems assessment , 2010, Biodiversity and Conservation.

[23]  P. Goderniaux,et al.  Investigating the respective impacts of groundwater exploitation and climate change on wetland extension over 150 years , 2014 .

[24]  R. E. Bartolo,et al.  Regional Ecological Risk Assessment for Australia's Tropical Rivers: Application of the Relative Risk Model , 2012 .

[25]  The Ecological Vulnerability Evaluation in Southwestern Mountain Region of China Based on GIS and AHP Method , 2010 .

[26]  Jinsheng Wang,et al.  Water demand forecasting of Beijing using the Time Series Forecasting Method , 2012, Journal of Geographical Sciences.

[27]  Om Prakash Yadav,et al.  A review on risk assessment techniques for hydraulic fracturing water and produced water management implemented in onshore unconventional oil and gas production. , 2016, The Science of the total environment.

[28]  Claude E. Shannon,et al.  A Mathematical Theory of Communications , 1948 .

[29]  Li He,et al.  Vulnerability assessment of urban ecosystems driven by water resources, human health and atmospheric environment , 2016 .

[30]  Fengchang Wu,et al.  Distribution Characteristics and Risk Assessments of PAHs in Fish from Lake Taihu, China , 2015 .

[31]  Edward R. Carr,et al.  Applying DPSIR to sustainable development , 2007 .

[32]  Magnus Moglia,et al.  Water Needs Assessment: learning to deal with scale, subjectivity and high stakes , 2010 .

[33]  Jinsheng Wang,et al.  A HIVE model for regional integrated environmental risk assessment: A case study in China , 2016 .

[34]  Karl Pearson F.R.S..  LIII. On lines and planes of closest fit to systems of points in space , 1901 .

[35]  Gillian H. Drew,et al.  Identifying Uncertainty in Environmental Risk Assessments: The Development of a Novel Typology and Its Implications for Risk Characterization , 2014 .

[36]  T. L. Saaty.  A Scaling Method for Priorities in Hierarchical Structures , 1977 .

[37]  M. Wong,et al.  Recent socio-economic changes in relation to environmental quality of the Pearl River delta , 2004 .

[38]  S Zeng,et al.  Integrated risk assessment and screening analysis of drinking water safety of a conventional water supply system. , 2007, Water science and technology : a journal of the International Association on Water Pollution Research.

[39]  Jing Liu,et al.  Sustainability assessment of regional water resources under the DPSIR framework , 2016 .

[40]  Qiang Huang,et al.  Integrated index for drought assessment based on variable fuzzy set theory: A case study in the Yellow River basin, China , 2015 .

[41]  Hai-long Ma,et al.  Exploring the relationship between urbanization and the eco-environment-A case study of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region , 2014 .