Integrated water security and coupling of social-ecological system to improve river basin sustainability

Ziyan Han; Yongping Wei; Jijun Meng; Yi Zou; Qiqi Wu

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.167182

Integrated water security and coupling of social-ecological system to improve river basin sustainability

Sci Total Environ. 2023 Dec 20:905:167182. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.167182. Epub 2023 Sep 19.

Authors

Ziyan Han¹, Yongping Wei², Jijun Meng³, Yi Zou⁴, Qiqi Wu⁴

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes of Ministry of Education, College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, PR China; School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, the University of Queensland, Australia.
² School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, the University of Queensland, Australia.
³ Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes of Ministry of Education, College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, PR China. Electronic address: jijunm@pku.edu.cn.
⁴ Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes of Ministry of Education, College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, PR China.

PMID: 37730052
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.167182

Abstract

The river basin sustainability depends on both the coordinated development of socio-ecological systems and resilience to water resources. However, the lack of integrating them on spatial and temporal scales compromises our capacity to develop precise interventions towards sustainable river basins. We developed an approach by integrating water security and social-ecological coupling to assess the river basin sustainability. We divided it into four categories including highly sustainable (secure and coordinated), insecure, uncoordinated, and low sustainable (insecure and uncoordinated). The middle reach of Heihe River (MHR) was taken as the study area with the sub-basin as the spatial analysis unit from 2000 to 2020. The results showed that there was heterogeneity and agglomeration in spatial distribution. 23.8 %, 38.8 %, and 11% of the sub-basins mainly clustered in the north and central areas were found in the state of water insecure and SES uncoordinated, or both respectively. The unsustainable areas (five sub-basins) and lose-lose areas (two sub-basins) should be the priority areas for management interventions. Our approach can provide an important reference for assessing and improving the river basin sustainability.

Keywords: River basin sustainability; Social-ecological coupling; Spatio-temporal analysis; The middle reaches of the Heihe River; Water security.