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Assessment of the water resource carrying capacity based on the ecological footprint: a case study in Zhangjiakou City, North China

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Abstract

With the rapid economic development in the past decades, industrialization and urbanization in China has also rapidly developed and will continue in the next decades. However, the regional water shortage has posed great challenges for the sustainable development of big cities especially in north China. Here, we used the water ecological footprint model combined with the system dynamic model to assess the water resource carrying capacity and its sustainability in Zhangjiakou City, a typical water shortage city in north China. The calculated results showed that irrigation was the largest water consumer in Zhangjiakou. There existed a clear gap between water supply and water consumption in this city and such a gap is demonstrated by the high water resource pressure index. Our predicted results based on the water resource ecological footprint and the system dynamic model showed that although the improving water use efficiency has relieved the regional water shortage pressure, the efficiency gained would be to a large degree offset by increased water demands due to the increasing economic development. The annual average water shortage in Zhangjiakou in 2007–2050 would be up to 8.53 × 108 m3, nearly half of the total local average annual water resource. To deal with the severe water shortage over the next three decades, great attention should be paid to scientific water resource managements and water pollution control. This research provides a long-term view of water resource pressure and provides recommendations for a sustainable water use under the rapid regional socioeconomic development.

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Funding

This work was financially supported by the National Science and Technology Major Project-Water Pollution Control and Treatment (2018ZX07111002).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Water Sciences, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, China

    Dan Dai

  2. River and Coastal Environment Research Center, Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Sciences, Beijing, 100012, China

    Dan Dai, Mingdong Sun, Xiangqin Xu & Kun Lei

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  1. Dan Dai
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  2. Mingdong Sun
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  3. Xiangqin Xu
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  4. Kun Lei
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Correspondence to Kun Lei.

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Dai, D., Sun, M., Xu, X. et al. Assessment of the water resource carrying capacity based on the ecological footprint: a case study in Zhangjiakou City, North China. Environ Sci Pollut Res 26, 11000–11011 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-019-04414-9

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