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

Abstract

ABSTRACTWith 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.