Ecological Environment Protection Research Articles

Environmental Decentralization, Resource Endowment and Urban Industrial Transformation and Upgrading: A Comparison of Resource-Based and Non-Resource-Based Cities in China

Based on panel data of resource-based and non-resource-based cities in China from 2011 to 2021, we empirically investigate the effects of environmental decentralization and resource endowment on urban industrial transformation and upgrading using a fixed-effects model and a threshold model. It is found that environmental decentralization promotes industrial transformation and upgrading in both types of city in China. However, the combined effect of resource endowment and environmental decentralization inhibits industrial transformation and upgrading in resource-based cities, while promoting it in non-resource-based cities. In addition, the influence of environmental decentralization and resource endowment on industrial transformation and upgrading varies depends on the degree of implementation. Therefore, it is imperative to continuously improve the environmental decentralization management system, scientifically utilize resource endowment and promote industrial transformation and upgrading based on the unique characteristics of resource-based and non-resource-based cities. Lastly, we should focus on the transformation and upgrading of traditional resource-based industries and strengthening the green innovation of new industries, aiming to achieve a win–win situation for ecological environmental protection and economic development.

The interactive relationship between ecological well-being performance and tourism economic development in major tourism cities in China

With the advent of mass tourism, the tourism industry has experienced unprecedented expansion in scale. The relationship between the tourism industry and ecology and society is a key issue in promoting sustainable development of tourist destinations. However, existing research has focused more on the relationship between ecological environment protection and tourism economic development, while neglecting the impact on human well-being in this process. Therefore, based on the concept of ecological welfare, this study explored the coupling coordination degree (CCD) and interaction relationship between the tourism economy development (TED) and ecological wel-being performance (EWP) of 58 major tourism cities in China, providing a more inclusive theoretical perspective and enriching the theory of sustainable tourism and ecological tourism. The results show that: (1) from 2004 to 2019, the EWP and TED of major tourism cities in China showed a steady upward trend. The improvement level of TED was more significant than that of EWP. (2) The CCD between EWP and TED of most tourism cities in China has been improved to varying degrees during the period from 2004 to 2019, especially in many inland tourism cities. (3) There is a dynamic interaction relationship between EWP and TED in major tourism cities in China during the research period, but a virtuous interaction has not yet been formed between the two. The results of this study can also provide practical insights for the sustainable development of urban tourism industry.

Impact of Urbanization on Ecosystem Service Value from the Perspective of Spatio-Temporal Heterogeneity: A Case Study from the Yellow River Basin

Ecosystem services are the beneficial goods and services that ecosystems provide to humans. Urbanization is an important feature of human social development. While promoting economic and social development, it also brings about land degradation, resource depletion, environmental pollution and other problems, intensifying the transformation of natural ecosystems into semi-natural and artificial ecosystems, ultimately leading to the loss of ecosystem service functions and declining value. The study of the impact of urbanization on the value of ecosystem services is of critical importance for the conservation of ecosystems and sustainable development. This study examined the spatio-temporal patterns of urbanization’s impacts on ecosystem service value in the Yellow River Basin from the perspective of spatio-temporal heterogeneity. Findings: (1) Both the ecosystem service value (ESV) and urbanization level (UL) in the Yellow River Basin were on the rise on the whole, but they were significantly spatially negatively correlated and mainly characterized by the high–low spatial clustering of “low ESV–high UL” and “high ESV–low UL”. This negative correlation was gradually weakened with the transformation of the urbanization development mode and ecological restoration projects in the Yellow River Basin. (2) The impacts of the five urbanization subsystems on the value of ecosystem services were diverse. Landscape urbanization had a negative impact on the value of ecosystem services in all regions; economic urbanization and innovation urbanization changed from having a negative to a positive impact; and demographic urbanization and social urbanization had both a positive and a negative impact. (3) To promote the coordinated development of ecological environmental protection and urbanization in the YRB, this paper proposes to change the urbanization development model, implement ecological restoration by zoning, and formulate classified development plans. This study compensates for the shortcomings of current studies that ignore the different impacts of urbanization subsystems on ecosystem service value and lack sufficient consideration of the spatio-temporal heterogeneity characteristics of urbanization and ESVs, enriches the theoretical understanding of the interrelationships between natural and human systems in basin areas, and provides a scientific basis for the rational formulation of urban planning and ecological protection policies in the region, which is of great theoretical and practical significance.

Review of the Researches on China􀆳s Ecological Environment Governance from the Perspective of Political Economics

The issue of ecology and environment is not only a technical and economic issue, but also a political one. The literature on environmental governance from the perspective of political economy can be divided into four categories: the perspective of governance capabilities of local government, the perspective of local government competition, the perspective of “government-enterprise collusion”, and the perspective of power balance. These four types of literature generally show a change from the benevolent government hypothesis to a self-interested government, from a holistic methodology that takes local governments as the unit of analysis to an individualist methodology that takes individual officials as the object of research, a change from a focus on the superficial reasons such as the government's ability to governance and the effectiveness of the policy to deep-seated reasons such as the power structure of the pluralistic subjects of society. This paper argues that ecological environmental protection involves the interests of multiple subjects, but the imbalance in the distribution of power and the pattern of interests among the subjects, and the excessive power of local government to speak and the insufficient ability of the public to participate in society, has led to the distortion of the environmental protection system in its implementation. This is why there local government has been behind all the major environmental pollution incidents in the country in recent years, and why almost all environmental pollution problems are obvious violations of existing laws and regulations, rather than a lack of institutions. The “interest-power-institution” equilibrium perspective provides a powerful theoretical framework for a comprehensive understanding of the prevention and control of ecological damage.

The construction of an ecological security pattern based on the comprehensive evaluation of the importance of ecosystem service and ecological sensitivity: a case of Yangxin County, Hubei Province

An ecological safety pattern is the basic guarantee for pollution control, ecological environmental protection, economic construction, and sustainable social development, and is an important means of integrated and coordinated development, protection, and governance. This study proposes a research method to identify ecological source sites based on the evaluation of the importance of ecosystem services and ecological sensitivity, and to identify ecological corridors using the minimum cumulative resistance model. The empirical analysis was carried out in Yangxin County, Hubei Province, as an example. The results show that the study area has 16 key corridors and 29 potential corridors, a total of 45 ecological corridors, with a total length of 452 km. In addition, these ecological corridors present a network-like intertwined distribution, connecting various ecological source sites and ensuring the connectivity between ecological source sites, while the well-developed water source sites in the study area provide excellent ecosystem service functions such as water containment for the area.

Research on the factors influencing the development of green finance in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei under the perspective of ecological environmental protection

In today's world, the contradiction between people and the ecological environment is becoming more and more acute. Green finance is an effective method to resolve the contradiction between economic growth and ecological environment pollution, which has been widely recognized by all countries. This paper analyzes the level of green financial development in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region through an analytical model of green financial development influencing factors constructed by simulation, combined with ecological environmental protection, and identifies the main influencing factors affecting the level of green financial development in this region. In addition, the realization path proposed in this paper from the perspective of government-led green financial development is, firstly, to improve green finance-related standards, assessment system and green financial legal system. The second is to implement green financial regulation and improve the driving force of green policy and market integration. The research results show that the comprehensive measurement score of green finance development level in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei region shows a steady increase between 2016 and 2020, among which the comprehensive measurement score of green finance development level in Beijing is as high as 72.13 in 2020, an increase of 17.32%. It provides theoretical guidance for the improvement of green financial public policies in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei regions.

A Study to Assess the Conservation Effectiveness of Nature Reserves in Hainan, China, from 2000 to 2021

Nature reserves are special habitats established for representative plant and animal ecosystems, and it is important to strengthen the monitoring and protection of nature reserves for ecological environmental protection. In this paper, 23 typical nature reserves of different levels and types on Hainan Island were selected as the study area. The InVEST model and LandTrendr algorithm were applied in habitat quality assessment and to anthropogenic disturbances of the study area from 2000 to 2021, respectively. Finally, an assessment mode was established, coupling the habitat quality assessment and anthropogenic disturbances, to analyze the spatial and temporal conservation effectiveness of the 23 nature reserves. The results indicate that the 23 nature reserves had good overall conservation effectiveness; 21 had an excellent effectiveness rating, and 2 had a good effectiveness rating between 2000 and 2021. Three of the nature reserves, namely, Dazhoudao, Dongzhaigang and Bangxi, have become significantly more effective. Provincial nature reserves are less effective than national nature reserves in terms of conservation, and are a key concern for follow-up. The conservation effectiveness of the four provincial nature reserves—Nanwan, Qinglangang, Dongfangheilianpilu and Qilinlai—is low, and there has been no significant trend of improvement over the past 21 years. The spatial and temporal changes in the conservation effectiveness of 23 nature reserves on Hainan Island over 21 years can provide scientific data support for the development of nature reserves and departmental supervision in Hainan Province.

Remote Sensing Monitoring and Analysis of Spatiotemporal Changes in China’s Anthropogenic Carbon Emissions Based on XCO2 Data

The monitoring and analysis of the spatiotemporal distribution of anthropogenic carbon emissions is an important part of realizing China’s regional “dual carbon” goals; that is, the aim is for carbon emissions to peak in 2030 an to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060, as well as achieving sustainable development of the ecological environment. The column-averaged CO2 dry air mole fraction (XCO2) of greenhouse gas remote sensing satellites has been widely used to monitor anthropogenic carbon emissions. However, selecting a reasonable background region to eliminate the influence of uncertainty factors is still an important challenge to monitor anthropogenic carbon emissions by using XCO2. Aiming at the problems of the imprecise selection of background regions, this study proposes to enhance the anthropogenic carbon emission signal in the XCO2 by using the regional comparison method based on the idea of zoning. First, this study determines the background region based on the Open-Data Inventory for Anthropogenic Carbon dioxide (ODIAC) dataset and potential temperature data. Second, the average value of the XCO2 in the background area was extracted and taken as the XCO2 background. On this basis, the XCO2 anomaly (XCO2ano) was obtained by regional comparison method. Finally, the spatiotemporal variation characteristics and trends of XCO2ano were analyzed, and the correlations between the number of residential areas and fossil fuel emissions were calculated. The results of the satellite observation data experiments over China from 2010 to 2020 show that the XCO2ano and anthropogenic carbon emissions have similar spatial distribution patterns. The XCO2ano in China changed significantly and was in a positive growth trend as a whole. The XCO2ano values have a certain positive correlation with the number of residential areas and observations of fossil fuel emissions. The purpose of this research is to enhance the anthropogenic carbon emission signals in satellite observation XCO2 data by combining ODIAC data and potential temperature data, achieve the remote sensing monitoring and analysis of spatiotemporal changes in anthropogenic carbon emissions over China, and provide technical support for the policies and paths of regional carbon emission reductions and ecological environmental protection.

A Self-Supervised Learning Approach for Extracting China Physical Urban Boundaries Based on Multi-Source Data

Physical urban boundaries (PUBs) are basic geographic information data for defining the spatial extent of urban landscapes with non-agricultural land and non-agricultural economic activities. Accurately mapping PUBs provides a spatiotemporal database for urban dynamic monitoring, territorial spatial planning, and ecological environment protection. However, traditional extraction methods often have problems, such as subjective parameter settings and inconsistent cartographic scales, making it difficult to identify PUBs objectively and accurately. To address these problems, we proposed a self-supervised learning approach for PUB extraction. First, we used nighttime light and OpenStreetMap road data to map the initial urban boundary for data preparation. Then, we designed a pretext task of self-supervised learning based on an unsupervised mutation detection algorithm to automatically mine supervised information in unlabeled data, which can avoid subjective human interference. Finally, a downstream task was designed as a supervised learning task in Google Earth Engine to classify urban and non-urban areas using impervious surface density and nighttime light data, which can solve the scale inconsistency problem. Based on the proposed method, we produced a 30 m resolution China PUB dataset containing six years (i.e., 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020). Our PUBs show good agreement with existing products and accurately describe the spatial extent of urban areas, effectively distinguishing urban and non-urban areas. Moreover, we found that the gap between the national per capita GDP and the urban per capita GDP is gradually decreasing, but regional coordinated development and intensive development still need to be strengthened.

The environmental and economic utility of the third-party governance of environmental pollution in China—an analysis based on the business registration information of enterprises

The third-party governance of environmental pollution (TEG) is a market-oriented mechanism designed to attract social capital to participate in ecological environmental protection. Can this mechanism result in positive and significant environmental and economic effects in developing countries? This paper examines the practical effectiveness of China’s pollution governance system reform by analyzing data on the registered business capital of the environmental protection industry in 285 prefecture-level cities during the period of 2003–2019. The study finds the following: TEG can effectively curb urban pollution emissions and improve the urban green total factor productivity (GTFP) of cities; heterogeneity analysis shows that specialization, marketization, and enterprise nature exert important impacts on its effectiveness; mechanism analysis shows that TEG can restrain pollution emissions by strengthening the tendency toward urban green technology progress; and its effects of releasing the industrial production capacity can be leveraged to improve the quality of economic development.

Research on the Trade-Offs and Synergies of Ecosystem Services and Their Impact Factors in the Taohe River Basin

The Taohe River Basin is an essential ecological function area in the upper reaches of the Yellow River. Understanding the intricate trade-offs and synergies between ecosystem services (ESs) and exploring the impact of different factors are essential for achieving win–win outcomes in ecosystem management and socioeconomic development. The role of impact factors on the relationship between ESs, nevertheless, is more challenging to spatialize. This study used different models to estimate the net primary productivity (NPP), water yield (WY), and soil conservation (SC), and analyzed synergies and trade-offs between Ess. The spatial heterogeneity of the effects of natural and social factors on the relationships between Ess was explored using a geographic detector and a multi-scale geographically weighted regression (MGWR) model. The results show that: (1) NPP, WY, and SC all exhibit a rising trend, with multi-year averages of 488.99 gC/m2, 157.29 mm, and 1441.51 t/hm2, respectively; (2) NPP–WY and NPP–SC exhibit trade-offs in the majority of regions, while WY–SC are primarily synergistic in the upper and middle reaches, and they have the highest percentage of cropland, forest, and grassland; and (3) precipitation (PRE) has the greatest impact on the trade-off between NPP–WY and NPP–SC in the upper and middle reaches, and the gross domestic product (GDP), population density (POP), and distance from cropland (CROP) are the primary factors determining the synergy between NPP and WY in the lower reaches of the Loess Plateau cropping sector. PRE, digital elevation model (DEM), and CROP are the primary impact factors affecting the synergy of WY–SC. This study may serve as a reference for examining the evolutionary mechanism underlying the trade-offs and synergies between ESs and provide a scientific basis for future ecological environmental protection and regional land management in the Taohe River Basin.

Characterizing the Development of Photovoltaic Power Stations and Their Impacts on Vegetation Conditions from Landsat Time Series during 1990–2022

To achieve carbon peaking and carbon neutrality in China, photovoltaic (PV) power generation has become increasingly important for promoting a low-carbon transition. The central and western desert areas of China have been identified as major areas for the construction of large PV bases. Remote sensing technology has been used to map the spatial distribution and development status of PV power stations quickly and accurately in ecologically fragile areas, as well as assess the ecological and environmental impact of their construction. However, current remote sensing monitoring of PV power stations focuses mainly on mapping and time series analysis to measure their development process and assess the environmental conditions on a large scale over a long period of time. Therefore, we constructed a random forest model based on image spectral and texture features and mapped 2022 PV power stations in the junction area of Hobq Desert, Ulan Buh Desert, Tengger Desert, and Mu Us Sands in China. Following that, we identified the construction time of the PV power stations by identifying the turning points of the normalized construction land index (NDBI) time series from 1990–2022 using the LandTrendr method. To assess the ecological impact of PV power stations, we used the NDVI to measure the change in vegetation condition before and after the construction of PV power stations and constructed NDVI changes for PV power stations constructed in different years. The results showed that this mapping method achieved an overall classification accuracy of 96.65% and a Kappa coefficient of 0.92. The root mean square error (RMSE) for construction year identification was less than 0.5, and the number of new PV power stations increased significantly after 2010, reaching a total area of 14.52 km2 by 2016, which is consistent with the trend driven by national and regional development plans. Furthermore, the study found that the vegetation cover level could be restored to the average level before construction within 5–6 years and continued to increase after that. These findings may help government policymakers and practitioners make decisions on PV power station planning and ecological environment protection, thus contributing promptly to the achievement of China’s dual carbon goals.

Research on Special Stability of Scientific Research Equipment on Oceanographic Research Vessels

With the development of economy, countries all over the world have gradually recognized the importance of the exploitation of marine resources, development of marine economy, and protection of marine ecological environment. As an important carrier and tool for the implementation of China’s national strategies such as “building China into a maritime power” and “Belt & Road”, oceanographic research vessels also face new demands and development prospects. The current standards and specifications for oceanographic research vessels in China are generally old and outdated, lack of professional specifications, and deficient of standard guidance for the use of scientific research equipment on oceanographic research vessels. From the perspective of the classification and special stability of scientific research equipment on oceanographic research vessels, an evaluation system for the stability of scientific research equipment is proposed, in hope of providing reference for the use of scientific research equipment on oceanographic research vessels.

The role of Marxist ecological view on environmental protection in China

Ecological problems and environmental problems have become more and more frequent, constantly sounding the alarm for people, seriously threatening the safety of people's lives and even survival. The construction of ecological culture has become an essential part of modern society and a vital wealth. Therefore, it is urgent to organize the study of the relevant concepts and theories of ecological construction, explain and solve the problems encountered in practice, and guide people to make scientific judgments. The main purpose of this article is to study the structure of ecological civilization from the perspective of Marxist ecological view. By analyzing ecological and environmental issues, following the principles of ecological civilization construction, adopting appropriate means, and relying on an indicator system for evaluation. This article constructs a comprehensive indicator system for the level of ecological environment protection, and analyzes the global spatial autocorrelation and local spatial autocorrelation of the comprehensive indicators. Research shows that urbanization construction and energy efficiency protection are still in a moderate imbalance state. Due to the lag of urbanization construction in the process of ecological environment protection, the two are in a low coordination state. How to combine Marxist ecological views with specific practices in China and effectively promote the process of ecological civilization construction in China still requires in-depth consideration.

Analysis of the coupling correlation between environmental protection efforts and economic development level based on artificial intelligence technology

Abstract In order to study the influence of environmental protection and economic development level under artificial intelligence technology, and to help achieve the goal of carbon peak in China, this paper studies the coupling degree of socio-economic and ecological environment system, establishes the evaluation index system of coupling between socio-economic system and ecological environment system, calculates the weight of each evaluation index and comprehensive evaluation index by using entropy value assignment method, construct the coupling degree of two systems model, and empirically analyze the coupling degree and coupling coordination socio-economic and eco-environmental systems. In addition, the comprehensive evaluation index of socio-economic and ecological environmental protection systems based on artificial intelligence technology was analyzed. The results show that AI technology benefits environmental protection, the urban economy and environmental protection as a whole are currently in a mutually beneficial symbiosis, and the two systems of ecological environment and high-quality economic development promote each other and develop together. The evaluation indexes of economic scale and economic capacity and social development as a whole are steadily increasing, from 0.00, 0.00, and 0.07 in 2010 to 0.28, 0.15, and 0.53 in 2019, respectively, where the evaluation indexes of economic scale and economic capacity are steadily increasing from 2010 to 2019 due to the rapid development of the tertiary industry, and the evaluation indexes of social development. The evaluation index of the economic scale, economic capacity, and social development drove the rapid development of the economy in 2012-2013, and the rapid development of the economy also led to the rapid development of society. After 2015, the coupling between the two systems has become more and more perfect.

Formation mechanism of NO2 distribution heterogeneity at different spatial scales

NO2 is one of the main pollutants in the atmospheric environment, which can directly or indirectly cause harm to human health. Jiangsu province is economically developed and densely populated, and the conflict between economic development and ecological environment protection is more prominent, which causes its mean annual NO2 concentration to be higher than other neighboring provinces. The study takes the formation mechanism of NO2 concentration distribution heterogeneity at different spatial scales as the research object. By using OMI satellite remote sensing data and NO2 concentration ground monitoring data in Jiangsu Province from 2015 to 2020, the paper studies NO2 concentration distribution heterogeneity at macroscopic and microscopic scales, respectively, to analyze the formation mechanism. The results show that: (1) The spatial distribution characteristics of NO2 concentration obtained based on the analysis of two data sources have good consistency, with the overall performance of high NO2 concentration in the south of Jiangsu where the concentration of NO2 column reached 16.3 × 1015 molec/cm 2 and the monitoring concentration reached 46.3μg/m3, while the concentration of NO2 in central Jiangsu is relatively low, with average concentrations of 6 × 1015 molec/cm 2 and 26μg/m3. (2) Under the macroscopic spatial scale, the average NO2 column concentration in the south of Jiangsu is 9 × 1015 molec/cm 2 higher and the monitoring concentration is 15μg/m3 than that in the north of Jiangsu; natural factors such as temperature are the important influencing factors for the heterogeneity of NO2 concentration distribution under this scale. (3) At the microscopic spatial scale, NO2 concentration is 5–10% higher in industrial concentrations in southern Jiangsu, some heating cities in northern Jiangsu, and industrial parks in northern Jiangsu. In addition, NO2 concentration decreases gradually with distance from this area; anthropogenic factors such as population density, GDP, and car ownership are important factors to influence the heterogeneity of NO2 concentration distribution at this scale. Based on the above findings, the paper proposes to adjust the industrial structure, limit the number of high energy-consuming and high-emission enterprises, and develop seasonal emission reduction measures.

Evaluation and Tradeoff of Ecosystem Services in Jiaozuo

With the continuous development of the economy and society, the demand for land space for human survival has also increased, which means that the pressure on ecosystem services has also been unprecedentedly high, leading to serious problems such as ecological environment deterioration and system function decline, resulting in fierce conflicts between ecological environment protection and human social development. Therefore, the relationship between ecosystem services and economic and social development has become a hot research topic in the field of land ecology. Jiaozuo City is also facing the problem of ecological degradation. In order to achieve coordinated development of ecology, society, and economy, this article analyzes the spatiotemporal changes in land use/cover in Jiaozuo City from 1995 to 2020. The InVEST model is used to evaluate four types of ecosystem services in Jiaozuo City: water production, carbon storage, soil conservation, and nutrient output; Summarize and summarize the spatiotemporal distribution characteristics and evolution laws of ecosystem services, and explore the trade-off and synergistic relationships between ecosystem service functions and their driving factors. The research results indicate that: (1) The main types of land use/cover in Jiaozuo City are arable land (64.5%), forest land (approximately 9.9%), grassland (1.1%), water area (0.6%), and construction land (23.8%). The changes in land use types are relatively small. (2) From 1995 to 2020, the biomass and spatial distribution evolution of the four ecosystem services in Jiaozuo City varied. There are significant interannual differences in water production services, and the spatial distribution of water production in the western region is lower than that in the eastern region. The southern region is lower than the northern region. The interannual variation of nutrient (phosphorus) output is relatively small, and the spatial distribution pattern varies greatly, showing a high and low value clustering distribution pattern. The interannual difference in soil conservation is relatively small. The interannual differences in carbon storage are small, and the annual spatial distribution is irregular. (3) Each ecosystem service is influenced by different natural and social influencing factors, and the contribution rate of natural factors is higher than that of social factors. There is a significant difference in the output capacity of ecosystem services among different land uses/covers, which directly affects the total amount and spatial distribution of ecosystem services. The ecological status of Jiaozuo City is worrying. In the future socio-economic development process, reasonable planning of land use should be carried out to vigorously ensure the parallel and healthy development of social economy and ecological environment.

Ecological Quality Status Evaluation of Port Sea Areas Based on EW-GRA-TOPSIS Model

It is of great significance to research a method to evaluate the ecological quality status of port sea areas objectively for the ecological environmental protection and sustainable development of sea areas. In this paper, a novel ecological quality status evaluation model is proposed based on the entropy weight method (EW), the gray relational analysis method (GRA), and the TOPSIS method. Firstly, a comprehensive evaluation indicator system is constructed from three aspects, namely seawater quality, sediments, and marine organisms. Secondly, the weight values of different indicators are obtained via the EW method, which can be obtained more objectively than via the subjective weighting method. Afterwards, the ecological quality status of port sea areas can be evaluated using the proposed method, which combines the advantages of the TOPSIS method and the GRA method. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed EW-GRA-TOPSIS model is illustrated by a case study based on a port sea area of Tianjin. The results show that 66.7% of the monitoring stations in the port sea area are at a good level, 25% of them are at a fair level, only 8.3% are at a poor level, and none are at an excellent or bad level. Additionally, the evaluation results obtained using the proposed model are more consistent with the actual survey results than the compared typical TOPSIS method. It can objectively reflect the ecological quality status of monitoring stations, and consequently, it could be helpful for the marine department to make decisions on the sustainable development of port sea areas. In a further study, the influence of decision makers’ preferences on the evaluation results could be considered, and a more reasonable method to determine the evaluation grade standard should be researched to improve the proposed model.

Molecular simulation for the relationship between the functional groups of chemical admixtures and cement hydration product Ca (OH)2 in the grouting process

Complex geological problems caused by natural environment have emerged constantly, causing serious damage to the land use and groundwater ecological environment in the western region. How to deal with the relationship between the above factors and ecological environment protection is a new research topic at present. Broken rock mass, cracks and water inrush during construction can be blocked and reinforced by grouting to achieve environmental protection. Therefore, to develop accurate quantitative models for the hydration of cement and predict the properties of grouting materials plays a crucial role during the protection process. In this study, the hydration product Ca(OH)2 is taken as an example, and the adsorption processes of different functional groups on the surface of Ca(OH)2 were investigated using DFT. The adsorption energy of the (101) surface was −0.38 Ha in sulfonic group, the lowest on different crystal planes of Ca(OH)2, while the adsorption energy of different functional groups is sulfonic group > carboxyl group > amide group > benzene ring. The adsorption energy was the lowest when the hydroxyl and carboxyl ratio was 1:1, suggesting that the adsorption energy and hydration performance in different ratios of hydroxyl and carboxyl groups will also be discrepant. After the adsorption of functional groups with Ca(OH)2, the electron clouds and orbitals rearranged, new characteristic peaks of the s orbital were present in the vicinity of −15 eV, −13 eV, and −10 eV, respectively. Since the relationship between functional groups and cement hydration process of chemical admixtures was explored, the mechanism of the cement hydration reaction and the influence of cement-based admixtures was revealed from an electronic view, also to extract the key influencing factors for the grouting and develop accurate quantitative models to predict and tackle various geo-environmental hazards.

Can New Urbanization Construction Improve Ecological Welfare Performance in the Yangtze River Economic Belt?

New urbanization construction can effectively improve resource allocation efficiency and promote high-quality development, so there is practical significance to exploring the relationship between new urbanization construction and ecological welfare performance in order to achieve a win-win situation of ecological environmental protection and high-quality development in the Yangtze River Economic Belt. This paper innovatively, from the perspective of input-output, constructs a framework for analyzing the ecological welfare performance, measures the ecological welfare performance of Yangtze River Economic Belt with SE-SBM model, and empirically analyzes the impact of new urbanization on ecological welfare performance using the fixed-effect model. The results showed that: (1). the ecological welfare performance of the Yangtze River Economic Belt showed a U-shaped trend of decreasing and then increasing as a whole. There were significant regional differences in the east, middle, and west of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, especially in the eastern region, a region that has shown an obvious growth trend. (2). Population and land urbanization had a significant negative inhibitory effect on improving ecological welfare performance. On the contrary, economic urbanization and social urbanization had significant positive effects on improving ecological welfare performance. (3). Adopting and implementing policies such as the National New Urbanization Plan (2021–2035) encouraged the co-development of new urbanization and ecological civilizations, promoting new urbanization construction and playing a beneficial role in transforming ecological welfare. So, the Yangtze River Economic Belt should promote a new type of urbanization going forward, promoting green transformation and the upgrading of industries, standardizing the utilization of land resources, improving the well-being of urban residents, and effectively governing urban environmental pollution.