The inhabited environment, infrastructure development and advanced urbanization in China's Yangtze River Delta Region

This paper analyzes the relationship among the inhabited environment, infrastructure development and environmental impacts in China's heavily urbanized Yangtze River Delta region. Using primary human environment data for the period 2006-2014, we examine factors affecting the inhabited environment and infrastructure development: urban population, GDP, built-up area, energy consumption, waste emission, transportation, real estate and urban greenery. Then we empirically investigate the impact of advanced urbanization with consideration of cities' differences. Results from this study show that the growth rate of the inhabited environment and infrastructure development is strongly influenced by regional development structure, functional orientations, traffic network and urban size and form. The effect of advanced urbanization is more significant in large and mid-size cities than huge and mega cities. Energy consumption, waste emission and real estate in large and mid-size cities developed at an unprecedented rate with the rapid increase of economy. However, urban development of huge and mega cities gradually tended to be saturated. The transition development in these cities improved the inhabited environment and ecological protection instead of the urban construction simply. To maintain a sustainable advanced urbanization process, policy implications included urban sprawl control polices, ecological development mechanisms and reforming the economic structure for huge and mega cities, and construct major cross-regional infrastructure, enhance the carrying capacity and improvement of energy efficiency and structure for large and mid-size cities

Advantages and dynamics of urban agglomeration development on Yangtze River Delta

National Natural Science Foundation of China 40971101 40901087Urban agglomeration on Yangtze River Delta (UA-YRD) had some advantages in the aspects of water, land, ecological environment, location and transportation. Relying on the resource-environment bases and other advantages, UA-YRD has achieved great development. Based on index system and model of comprehensive evaluation, the paper calculates the development level of UA-YRD since 1978. The result shows that from 1978 to 2007, the development level increased year by year at an annual rate of 0.0333, and the process of development could be divided into three stages, i.e. low-speed development stage (1978-1991), rapid development stage (1991-2000), and high-speed development stage (2000-2007). The speeds are 0.0083, 0.0356 and 0.0766, respectively. During the 30-year development, foreign economic activity has the greatest effect on development, followed by transportation, industrial economic activity and telecommunication (in order). Additionally, different driving forces have different effects in different stages. The paper suggests that more attention should be paid to the high-speed development stage and the important driving forces to drive its development. At the same time, the limitation of resource and environment should not be neglected and a long effective mechanism needs to be established to sustain harmonious development among the UA development, resource utilization and environmental protection. Some comparative studies should be carried out urgently to support and promote sustainable development of UA effectively, especially towards evolution, driving forces and braking forces

Comparative assessment of the vulnerability and resilience of 10 deltas : work document

Background information about: Nile delta (Egypt), Incomati delta (Mozambique), Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna (Bangladesh), Yangtze (China), Ciliwung (Indonesia), Mekong (Vietnam), Rhine-Meuse (The Netherlands), Danube (Romania), California Bay-Delta, Mississippi River Delta (USA

Comparitive assessment of the vulnerability and resilience of 10 deltas, synthesis report

The proposed framework for delta assessment and especially the scorecards are intended to enhance awareness raising, discussion and prioritization on most relevant delta issues, in each delta but also in comparison with other deltas. This should lead to more efficient and effective (multi-sectoral) policy formulation, management design and implementation, in concrete Delta plans, pilot-projects and (research) programmes. The target groups are all stakeholders who are involved in delta management at different levels and with different interests (government, private companies, NGOs, public), and who wish to contribute to the resilience of their own delta and other deltas worldwide

Spatial assessment and management of regional ecosystem services in the Yangtze River Delta Region

The Yangtze River Delta (YRD) metropolitan region is one of the most rapidly urbanized regions in China and has experienced a remarkable period of population growth (at an annual growth rate of 3.0%), and urbanization (at an annual growth rate of 9.2%). Rapid urbanization has dramatically changed land use/land cover patterns and ecosystems in the region, causing widespread environmental problems such as habitat fragmentation, aggravation of environmental pollution, decline in biodiversity and ecosystem degredation. These problems have restricted the sustainable development of socio-economic system of the Yangtze River Delta Region. Facing the challenges, the Yangtze River Delta Region is carrying out the practice of regional integration planning and cooperation in environmental governance, which urgently needs the guidance of relevant theories and methods. Some of the key environmental policy pilots have been carried on in this region, such as the Ecological Red Line Policy (Bai et al, 2016; Lü et al, 2013). This policy has one of the main objectives of protecting important eco-function areas i.e. ecosystem service hot spots, to deliver services such as water storage, clean drinking water, and carbon sequestration, and to maintain ecological safety to support economic and social development, which an important policy orientation of ecosystem services approach.Ecosystem services are the contributions of ecosystem structure and function to human well-being, connecting natural and socio-economic systems. The ecosystem services approach is considered to be one of the important decision support tools for guiding and formulating environmental policies. Based on the theories and methods of ecosystem services, combined with local expert knowledge, remote sensing and GIS technologies, this dissertation aims is mainly to develop a comprehensive framework of ecosystem services assessment and decision support for rapid urbanization regions.Based on this framework, the spatial characteristics, supply-demand relationship and flow direction of ecosystem services in the Yangtze River Delta Region are analysed and evaluated. Main results of this thesis are as follows:(1) According to the characteristics of the regional ecosystems of the Yangtze River Delta Region, combined with local expert knowledge, the Burkhard’s scoring and assessment method of ecosystem services was improved, and the score matrix between twelve ecosystem types and twenty-three ecosystem services in the Yangtze River Delta Region was established.(2) Based on DPSIR model, the characteristics of the social-ecological complex ecosystem and change of ecosystem services in the Yangtze River Delta Region were analysed. The main ecological and environmental problems were identified. Causes and main driving forces of decline in ecosystem services were revealed in the region.(3) Based on ARCGIS platform, the status quo of ecosystem services in the Yangtze River Delta region was analysed and evaluated. The spatial differentiation characteristics and main impact factors of ecosystem services in the Yangtze River Delta region were clarified. The hot spots of total ecosystem services were aggregated in the southwest areas, while the cold spots were distributed in the middle and northeast areas of the region. The hot spots of supporting services and regulating services aggregately distributed in the southwest mountainous areas while hot spots of provisioning services mainly in the northeast plain, and high value of cultural services widespread in the waterbodies and southwest mountainous areas. The spatial heterogeneity is determined by biophysical features and land use types. Based on the assessment, six major ecosystem services functional zones were divided: (I) South Ecological Integrity Conservation Zone, (II) Southwest Mountainous and Hilly Forest Ecological Zone, (III) Northeast Plain Agriculture Ecological Zone, (IV) Middle Aquatic Ecological Conservation Zone, (V) Eastern Coastal Estuaries Ecological Zone, and (VI) Urban Development Area., and the corresponding management strategies on the basis of environmental problems and ecosystem services characteristics in each of the functional zones were put forward.(4) Using regional spatial data in net primary productivity, the quality levels of forest and cropland were graded and the previous scores of ecosystem services in forest and cropland were calibrated. Then, the hot spots and clustering patches of forest and farmland ecosystem services were identified by ARCGIS tools. Finally, the forest ecosystem conservation areas (red line) and cropland ecosystem conservation areas (red line) in the Yangtze River Delta region were delineated.(5) Based on the improved Burkhard’s supply-demand budget of ecosystem services method, the budgets of three regulating services (erosion regulating service, flood regulating service and water purification regulating service) of the sixteen core cities in the region were established, and the characteristics of surplus and deficit of three services of the cities in the region were analysed. Combing the budget with analysis of flow direction of ecosystem services, the potential provisioning cities and the benefiting cities of ecosystem services are identified. On the basis of the results, the potential model of regional inter-city environmental cooperation is proposed.This dissertation not only improves the methods of ecosystem service assessment and decision support in rapidly urbanized regions, but also makes contributions to the guidance in delineation of ecological red line, regional environmental cooperation and sustainable development in the Yangtze River Delta Region

Exploration of eco-environment and urbanization changes in coastal zones: A case study in China over the past 20 years

Abstract With the rapid development of urbanization and population migration, since the 20th century, the natural and eco-environment of coastal areas have been under tremendous pressure due to the strong interference of human response. To objectively evaluate the coastal eco-environment condition and explore the impact from the urbanization process, this paper, by integrating daytime remote sensing and nighttime remote sensing, carried out a quantitative assessment of the coastal zone of China in 2000–2019 based on Remote Sensing Ecological Index (RSEI) and Comprehensive Nighttime Light Index (CNLI) respectively. The results showed that: 1) the overall eco-environmental conditions in China's coastal zone have shown a trend of improvement, but regional differences still exist; 2) during the study period, the urbanization process of cities continued to advance, especially in seaside cities and prefecture-level cities in Jiangsu and Shandong, which were much higher than the average growth rate; 3) the Coupling Coordination Degree (CCD) between the urbanization and eco-environment in coastal cities is constantly increasing, but the main contribution of environmental improvement comes from non-urbanized areas, and the eco-environment pressure in urbanized areas is still not optimistic. As a large-scale, long-term series of eco-environment and urbanization process change analysis, this study can provide theoretical support for mesoscale development planning, eco-environment condition monitoring and environmental protection policies from decision-makers

Evaluation of long-term tropospheric NO2 columns and the effect of different ecosystem in Yangtze River Delta

AbstractThe spatial and temporal characters of tropospheric NO2 column over Yangtze River Delta (YZD) are analyzed using monthly averaged tropospheric NO2 column densities from GOME (1996-2002) and SCIAMACHY (2003-2010) measurements. In addition, with the NO2 column densities data and the land cover maps of YZD, the characters of NO2 concentration over different ecosystem have been analyzed. The results indicated that the tropospheric NO2 column densities in YZD increased distinctly from 1996 to 2010 and it showed distinct regional and seasonal variation characteristics. It has the highest concentration in winter while lowest in summer. It also presents zonal distribution and decreasing along the Yangtze River from eastern to western. Under the influence of the urbanization process, the highest NO2 column densities appeared at cities and metropolis which are located in the Shanghai, Nanjing as well as Hangzhou. Moreover the lowest column densities appeared at the forest areas which are in the south and west of Zhejiang province. The sharp increasing of appeared in water bodies, followed urban area and water bodies. The lowest increasing of NO2 column appeared in grassland. Furthermore, we inferred the ground-level NO2 concentration from the GOME and SCIAMACHY data in this paper. We compared with the dry plus of N deposition which inferred from the remote sensing data and the mass concentration of N dry deposition from the control experiments, they performed significant correlation (P<0.001), and have the high R value (R2=0.86)

Total factor productivity of land urbanization under carbon emission constraints: a case study of Chengyu urban agglomeration in China

In consideration of energy and environmental inefficiency brought about by urban construction, sustainable urbanization has become a hot issue in recent years. In the process of land urbanization, the source of economic growth can be attributed to technical progress and efficiency improvement. To explore the driving factors of land urbanization efficiency and its dynamic changes, the total factor productivity (TFP) and its components of land urbanization was introduced. The spatial-temporal variations of land urbanization of Chengyu urban agglomeration in Western China were estimated by using the Malmquist-Luenberger (ML) productivity index with undesirable output in this study. Results demonstrate that: (1) the average TFP of land urbanization (LUTFP) of Chengyu urban agglomeration in China over time with carbon emissions (1.029) is 1.2 percent lower than that without carbon emissions (1.041). Furthermore, the LUTFP with CO2 emissions is lower than the LUTFP without CO2, demonstrating that land urbanization generates social and economic benefits at the cost of resource consumption. (2) LUTFP of Chengyu urban agglomeration under carbon emission constraints presents a generally rising trend in the past ten years and technical progress is the major source of such growth. Efficiency has become a major barrier against the improvement of productivity. (3) LUTFP indexes in Chongqing City and Chengdu plain economic region are generally higher than those of the south and northeast Sichuan economic zones. However, LUTFP of different cities tends to be in equilibrium gradually

Dams, moats, and cities: climate and societies in late-Holocene China

Whilst the late-Holocene climate was becoming drier with an increasing number of climatic anomalies, with notably more frequent fluctuations in summer rainfall on an annual or decadal scale, many walled sites or cities emerged and became regional centres that witnessed population agglomeration and technological flowering. To feed their growing populations and their increasing demands on land, water, food, and other resources, these ‘cities’ were drawn closer physically to riverine environments and wetlands. By diversifying and intensifying their subsistence strategies, and constructing infrastructure on a colossal scale, these late-Holocene walled towns or cities also fundamentally transformed their local landscapes. Examining key sites from the Huai river and the Yangtze Delta, this paper will compare the dynamic interactions between society, landscape, and the environment under different socio-economic conditions across different regions of late-Holocene China and investigate how these factors influenced and led to the emergence of complex societies or early states

Urban and Regional Cooperation and Development

This is an open access book. This book, first of all, introduces the new unveiled Guangdong-Macao Intensive Cooperation Zone with details as a special mode of the regional collaborative development that is committed to be mutually beneficial to both sides with different political and economic systems. China's central authorities have recently issued a masterplan for constructing the Guangdong-Macao Intensive Cooperation Zone at Hengqin Island in September 2021. As China's first and last European colony and one of China’s two special administrative regions (SARs), Macao has developed the gambling industry seven times larger than that of Las Vegas. However, the problem of the homogeneous industrial structure and the urgent need to promote sustainable economic growth by regional cooperation have been important theoretical and practical issues discussed by scholars and policy-makers. The Guangdong-Macao Intensive Cooperation Zone (ICZ) is managed under special customs supervision between two boarder lines and expected to diversify Macao’s economy. Then, this book dissects the theory of regional synergistic development and its applications in a number of international comparative and cross-interdisciplinary case studies worldwide. Finally, from the perspective of land use, transportation connection, and social service, this book thoroughly explores the challenges and strategies to implement the new cooperation model within the framework of one country, two systems, two customs, and two currencies to achieve a win–win situation using updated first-hand data collected by literature review, case study, field survey, spatial analysis, and interview