Eco-environmental vulnerability assessment for large drinking water resource: a case study of Qiandao Lake Area,China

Abstract

The Qiandao Lake Area (QLA) is of great significance in terms of drinking water supply in East Coast China as well as a nationally renowned tourist attraction. A series of laws and regulations regarding the QLA environment have been enacted and implemented throughout the past decade with the aim of negating the harmful effects associated with expanding urbanization and industrialization. In this research, an assessment framework was developed to analyze the eco-environmental vulnerability of the QLA from 1990–2010 by integrating fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP) and geographical information systems (GIS) in an attempt to gain insights into the status quo of the QLA so as to review and evaluate the effectiveness of the related policies. After processing and analyzing the temporal and spatial variation of eco-environmental vulnerability and major environmental issues in the QLA, we found that the state of eco-environmental vulnerability of the QLA was acceptable, though a moderate deterioration was detected during the study period. Furthermore, analysis of the combination of vulnerability and water quality indicated that the water quality showed signs of declination, though the overall status remained satisfactory. It was hence concluded that the collective protection and treatment actions were effective over the study period, whereas immediately stricter measures would be required for protecting the drinking water quality from domestic sewage and industrial wastewater. Finally, the spatial variation of the eco-environmental vulnerability assessment also implied that specifically more targeted measures should be adopted in respective regions for long-term sustainable development of the QLA.

Keywords

eco-environment / vulnerability assessment / drinking water source / fuzzy AHP / GIS / Qiandao Lake Area

Qing Gu obtained his Bachelor’s degree in 2009 from Nanjing Agricultural University, China and is a Ph.D student in the Institution of Remote Sensing and Information System Application at Zhejiang University, China. His research area includes: remote sensing applications in ecology and water resources assessment. E-mail: [e-mail]

Jun Li is an Assistant Professor in Institution of Remote Sensing and Information System Application at Zhejiang University, China, and research staff in the School of Civil Engineering & Environmental Sciences and the School of Meteorology at the University of Oklahoma. He obtained her master degree in 2006 from College of Environmental & Resource Sciences of Zhejiang University, China. Her primary area of research is eco-environmental evaluation and management. E-mail: [e-mail]

Jinsong Deng is an Associate Professor in Institution of Remote Sensing and Information System Application at Zhejiang University, China, and research staff in the School of Civil Engineering & Environmental Sciences and the School of Meteorology at the University of Oklahoma. He obtained his Ph.D in 2006 from College of Environmental & Resource Sciences of Zhejiang University, China. His primary area of research is application of remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS). E-mail: [e-mail]

Yi Lin obtained her Bachelor’s degree in 2012 from Zhejiang University, China and is a graduate student in Institution of Remote Sensing and Information System Application at Zhejiang University, China. Her research fields focus on ecological evaluations with remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS) applications. E-mail: [e-mail]

Ligang Ma earned his Bachelor’s degree in 2009 from Jilin University, China and is a Ph.D Candidate in Institution of Remote Sensing and Information System Application at Zhejiang University, China. His current research interests focus on remote sensing image classification. E-mail: [e-mail]

Chaofan Wu obtained her Bachelor’s degree in 2010 from Taiyuan University of Technology, China and is a Ph.D student in Institution of Remote Sensing and Information System Application at Zhejiang University, China. Her research fields focus on remote sensing image classification and remote sensing applications in ecological evaluations. E-mail: [e-mail]

Ke Wang is a Professor in College of Environmental & Resource Sciences of Zhejiang University, China and is a Senior Research Scientist of the Institution of Remote Sensing and Information System Application of Zhejiang University, China. His research interests are application of remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS), rice nutrition diagnosis and land use planning. E-mail: [e-mail]

Yang Hong is currently Professor of hydro-meteorology-climatology and remote sensing in the School of Civil Engineering & Environmental Sciences at the University of Oklahoma and adjunct faculty member of Tsinghua University. Dr. Hong has served on several international and national committees, review panels, and editorial board of several journals. Dr. Hong’s areas of research span the wide range of hydrology-meteorology-climatology, with particular interest in bridging the gap among the water-weather-climate-human systems across scales in space and time. E-mail: [e-mail]

References

[1] Adger W N (2006). Vulnerability. Glob Environ Change, 16(3): 268–281

[2] Bockelmann B N, Fenrich E K, Lin B, Falconer R A (2004). Development of an ecohydraulics model for stream and river restoration. Ecol Eng, 22(4–5): 227–235

[3] Buckley J J (1985). Fuzzy hierarchical analysis. Fuzzy Sets Syst, 17(3): 233–247

[4] Chang D Y (1996). Applications of the extent analysis method on fuzzy AHP. Eur J Oper Res, 95(3): 649–655

[5] Chen B, Chen G Q (2009). Emergy-based energy and material metabolism of the Yellow River basin. Commun Nonlinear Sci Numer Simul, 14(3): 923–934

[6] Chen G Q, Ji X (2007). Chemical exergy based evaluation of water quality. Ecol Modell, 200(1–2): 259–268

[7] Chen Z M, Chen G Q (2013). Virtual water accounting for the globalized world economy: national water footprint and international virtual water trade. Ecol Indic, 28: 142–149

[8] Chen Z M, Chen G Q, Xia X H, Xu S Y (2012). Global network of embodied water flow by systems input-output simulation. Front Earth Sci, 6(3): 331–344

[9] Chou T Y, Liang G S (2001). Application of a fuzzy multi-criteria decisionmaking model for shipping company performance evaluation. Marit Policy Manage, 28(4): 375–392

[10] Eakin H, Luers A L (2006). Assessing the vulnerability of social-environmental systems. Annu Rev Environ Resour, 31(1): 365–394

[11] Eisele M, Steinbrich A, Hildebrand A, Leibundgut C (2003). The significance of hydrological criteria for the assessment of the ecological quality in river basins. Phys Chem Earth Parts ABC, 28(12–13): 529–536

[12] Enea M, Piazza T (2004). Project Selection by Constrained Fuzzy AHP. Fuzzyoptimization and Decision Making (Vol. 3). New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers

[13] Ertuğrul Ertugrul I, Karakasoglu N (2009). Performance evaluation of Turkish cementfirms with fuzzy analytic hierarchy process and TOPSIS methods. Expert Syst Appl, 36(1): 702–715

[14] Fang Z F (2000). Introduction of coordinated development countermeasures of tourism and the environment in Qiandao Lake area. Administration and Technique of Environmental Monitoring, 12(B12): 12–13 (in Chinese)

[15] Ford J D, Smit B, Wandel J (2006). Vulnerability to climate change in the Arctic: a case study from Arctic Bay, Canada. Glob Environ Change, 16(2): 145–160

[16] Gowrie M N (2005). Environmental vulnerability index for the Island of Tobago, West Indies. Conservation Ecology, 7(2): 11–28

[17] Guo R J, Chen F R, Zhu Q (2001). Evaluation and analysis of capacity of forestry sustainable development in Chun`an County. Journal of Zhejiang Forestry College, 18(4): 337–344 (in Chinese)

[18] Hu S J (2005). Present situation and management countermeasures of soil and water loss in Qiandaohu watershed. Soil and Water Conservation Science and Technology in Shanxi, (2) (in Chinese)

[19] Isidori M, Lavorgna M, Nardelli A, Parrella A (2004). Integrated environmental assessment of Volturno River in South Italy. Sci Total Environ, 327(1–3): 123–134

[20] Jessop A (2004). Minimally biased weight determination in personnel selection. Eur J Oper Res, 153(2): 433–444

[21] Jiang Y (2009). China’s water scarcity. J Environ Manage, 90(11): 3185–3196

[22] Jiang Z, Su S, Jing C, Lin S, Fei X, Wu J (2012). Spatiotemporal dynamics of soil erosion risk for Anji County, China. Stochastic Environ Res Risk Assess, 26(6): 751–763

[23] Krivtsov V (2004). Investigations of indirect relationships in ecology and environmental sciences: a review and the implications for comparative theoretical ecosystem analysis. Ecol Modell, 174(1–2): 37–54

[24] Levy J K (2005). Multiple criteria decision making and decision support systems for flood risk management. Stochastic Environ Res Risk Assess, 19(6): 438–447

[25] Li A N, Wang A S, Liang S L, Zhou W (2006). Eco-environmental vulnerability evaluation in mountainous region using remote sensing and GIS-A case study in the upper reaches of Minjiang River, China. Ecol Modell, 192(1–2): 175–187

[26] Li L, Shi Z H, Yin W, Zhu D, Ng S L, Cai C F, Lei A L (2009). A fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP) approach to eco-environmental vulnerability assessment for the Danjiangkou reservoir area, China. Ecol Modell, 220(23): 3439–3447

[27] Li T S, Huang H H (2009). Applying TRIZ and Fuzzy AHP to develop innovative design for automated manufacturing systems. Expert Syst Appl, 36(4): 8302–8312

[28] Li Z W, Zeng G M, Zhang H, Yang B, Jiao S (2007). The integrated eco-environment assessment of the red soil hilly region based on GIS—A case study in Changsha City, China. Ecol Modell, 202(3–4): 540–546

[29] Liu J, Diamond J (2005). China’s environment in a globalizing world. Nature, 435(7046): 1179–1186

[30] Liu Y, Li R, Song X (2005). Grey associative analysis of regional urbanization and eco-environment coupling in China. Acta Geogr Sin, 60(2): 237–247 (in Chinese)

[31] Locantore N W, Tran L T, O'Neill R V, McKinnis P W, Smith E R, O'Connell M (2004). An overview of data integration methods for regional assessment. Environ Monit Assess, 94(1–3): 249–261

[32] Lv H C, Xue S G, Fang Z F (2004). Influence of different land use patterns upon nitrogen and phosphorus loss in the Qiandaohu drainage area. Geology in China, 31(z1) (in Chinese)

[33] Mendoza G A, Prabhu R (2000). Multiple criteria decision making approaches to assessing forest sustainability using criteria and indicators: a case study. For Ecol Manage, 131(1–3): 107–126

[34] Meng J, Chen G Q, Shao L, Li J S, Tang H S, Hayat T, Alsaedi A, Alsaadi F (2014). Virtual water accounting for building: case study for E-town, Beijing. J Clean Prod, 68(0): 7–15

[35] MWR (Ministry of Water Resources, P.R. China) (2007). The 11th Five-Year Plan of National Water Resources Development, Gazette of the Ministry of Water Resources of the P.R. China, 34–48

[36] Popp J H, Hyatt D E, Hoag D (2000). Modeling environmental condition with indices: a case study of sustainability and soil resources. Ecol Modell, 130(1–3): 131–143

[37] Sadiq R, Tesfamariam S (2009). Environmental decision-making under uncertainty using intuitionistic fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (IF-AHP). Stochastic Environ Res Risk Assess, 23(1): 75–91

[38] SC (State Council, P.R. China) (2006). The 11th Five-Year National Plan for Social and Economic Development. Beijing: People’s Publishing House

[39] Shao L, Chen G Q (2013). Water footprint assessment for wastewater treatment: method, indicator, and application. Environ Sci Technol, 47(14): 7787–7794

[40] Shao L, Wu Z, Zeng L, Chen Z M, Zhou Y, Chen G Q (2013). Embodied energy assessment for ecological wastewater treatment by a constructed wetland. Ecol Modell, 252: 63–71

[41] Su S, Chen X, DeGloria S D, Wu J (2010). Integrative fuzzy set pair model for land ecological security assessment: a case study of Xiaolangdi Reservoir Region, China. Stochastic Environ Res Risk Assess, 24(5): 639–647

[42] Van Laarhoven P J M, Pedrycz W (1983). A fuzzy extension of Saaty’s prioritytheory. Fuzzy Sets Syst, 11(1–3): 199–227

[43] Villa F, Mcleod H (2002). Environmental vulnerability indicators for environmental planning and decision-making: guidelines and applications. Environ Manage, 29(3): 335–348

[44] Wen J (2004). Study on ecological risk assessment in Qiandao Lake area. Dissertation for PhD degree. Changsha: Central South University of Forestry and Technology (in Chinese)

[45] Yang T, Liu J L, Chen Q Y (2013). Assessment of plain river ecosystem function based on improved gray system model and analytic hierarchy process for the Fuyang River, Haihe River Basin, China. Ecological Modeling, 268(24): 37–47

[46] Zhao Y (1999). Distribution and Comprehensive Repair of Chinese Environmental Vulnerability Types. Beijing: Chinese Environmental Sciences Press, 1–30 (in Chinese)

[47] Zhao Y Z, Zou X Y, Cheng H, Jia H K, Wu Y Q, Wang G Y, Zhang C L, Gao S Y (2006). Assessing the ecological security of the Tibetan plateau: methodology and a case study for Lhaze County. J Environ Manage, 80(2): 120–131

[48] Zhu Z Y, Zhou H Y, Ouyang T P, Deng Q L, Kuang Y Q, Huang N S (2001). Water shortage: a serious problem in sustainable development of China. Int J Sustain Dev World Ecol, 8(3): 233–237

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by Survey and Evaluation of National Ecological Environment (2000–2010) using the Remote sensing Program of the Chinese Ministry of Environmental Protection (No. STSN-05-11). We gratefully acknowledge the Environmental Science Research Institute, Zhejiang Province for providing valuable data.

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

2014 Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg