Flooding Hazards across Southern China and Prospective Sustainability Measures

Abstract

The Yangtze River Basin and Huaihe River Basin in Southern China experienced severe floods 1998 and 2016. The reasons for the flooding hazards include the following two factors: hazardous weather conditions and degradation of the hydrological environment due to anthropogenic activities. This review work investigated the weather conditions based on recorded data, which showed that both 1998 and 2016 were in El Nino periods. Human activities include the degradations of rivers and lakes and the effects caused by the building of the Three Gorges Dam. In addition, the flooding in 2016 had a lower hazard scale than that in 1998 but resulted in larger economic losses than that of 1998. To mitigate urban waterlogging caused by flooding hazards, China proposed a new strategy named Spongy City (SPC) in 2014. SPC promotes sustainable city development so that a city has the resilience to adapt to climate change, to mitigate the impacts of waterlogging caused by extreme rainfall events. The countermeasures used to tackle the SPC construction-related problems, such as local inundation, water resource shortage, storm water usage, and water pollution control, are proposed for city management to improve the environment.

Assessment of Social-Economic Risk of Chinese Dual Land Use System Using Fuzzy AHP

“…AHP was originally proposed by Saaty [19][20][21]. AHP can evaluate the results both qualitatively and quantitatively.…”

“…Based on the judgment matrix, the weight of each factor can be calculated. According to Saaty [19][20][21], if the value of consistent ratio (CR) is less than 0.1, the judgment matrix is reasonable; if the value of CR is greater than 0.1, then the judgment matrix is unreasonable and must be re-determined. The detailed calculation process of the weight and CR is listed in the Appendix A.…”

“…The relative importance of two elements was rated using the nine-scale method. The judgment matrix of index layer (U i ) to object layer (U) can be established according to the AHP method by Saaty [19][20][21]. Similarly, the judgment matrix of factor layer to index layer can also be established.…”

“…Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is an effective tool to evaluate the environmental impact of human activity to keep urban development sustainable [14,17]. SEA considers the principles of environmental impact assessment in urban planning and decision-making policy for sustainable development [18,19]. SEA has been adopted by numerous countries to enhance sustainability of development.…”

SuDS & Sponge Cities: A Comparative Analysis of the Implementation of Pluvial Flood Management in the UK and China

“…In China, Zheng et al [14] show that the increased rate of urbanization since the economic reform in 1978 has coincided with a steady increase in large flood events. The 2016 floods impacted 26 southern provinces in China, with estimated losses in excess of USD 500 billion [15]. In July 2012, the Fangshan District of Beijing experienced 460 mm of rainfall in 24 hours, three times the daily average, which caused over USD 1.86 billion of damage and impacted 1.6 million people [16].…”