Abstract
Using the constituent elements of vulnerability, an evaluation index system for the ecological vulnerability of coastal areas under oil spill stress is established based on “Sensitivity–Adaptive Capacity-Exposure”. After selecting a gulf in China as the main case study in this work, the cluster analysis and reference method were applied in grading and value assigning for all indexes. In addition, the analytic hierarchy process and expert evaluation method were used to determine the index weighting. Finally, a comprehensive evaluation method was adopted in the evaluation studies on the ecological vulnerability of the gulf coastal zone under oil spill stress. Results show the differences between the gulf area and areas that belong to different ecologically-vulnerable areas under oil spill stress.
Highlights
Owing to the rapid development of offshore oil exploitation and transportation industries, the number of oil tankers on the sea continues to increase, which heightens the potential risks of offshore oil spill accidents
To help the emergency decision makers of oil spill accidents identify the hotspots of the coastal zone rapidly, develop the oil spill clean-up strategies scientifically, and reduce the losses caused by oil spill accidents, as well as the ecological damage during the accident clean-up process, scholars and experts have carried out research on the ecological vulnerability of the coastal zone under oil spill stress
Studies on vulnerability evaluation of coastal zones under oil spill stress have been conducted in New Zealand, Israel, Australia, Spain, and Brazil, among others [3,4,5,6,7]
Summary
Owing to the rapid development of offshore oil exploitation and transportation industries, the number of oil tankers on the sea continues to increase, which heightens the potential risks of offshore oil spill accidents. Studies on vulnerability evaluation of coastal zones under oil spill stress have been conducted in New Zealand, Israel, Australia, Spain, and Brazil, among others [3,4,5,6,7]. The number of quantitative studies on coastal vulnerability evaluation under oil spill stress has gradually increased. In 2011, Milena Marilia et al [9] divided the coastal vulnerability under oil spill stress into socio-economic vulnerability and natural vulnerability, superimposed the scores of each indicator, and obtained the vulnerability distribution of coastal areas. There is significant research on ecological vulnerability assessment of coastal zones under oil spill scenarios, there were no mature and suitable theoretical systems to guide the authors, as it is easy to confuse vulnerability and sensitivity, and the evaluation methods in other studies were different. Combined with the results of numerical simulation of an oil spill, a distribution of the coastal zone’s vulnerability under oil spill stress was delineated
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