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In response to the intense development of the marine industry around the world, marine industrial parks are increasingly being established in coastal areas. To more effectively ensure the sustainable development of these industrial parks, an indicator system must be constructed to evaluate their sustainability. Therefore, a sustainability indicator system based on the driver-pressure-state-impact-response (DPSIR) framework was developed in this study and used to evaluate the sustainability of Shishi Marine Biotechnology Park, Fujian Province, China, between 2013 and 2016. Both the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and the entropy method were used to calculate the weights of the indices, and the indicator variables and evaluation models were uniformly transformed to obtain normalized sustainability scores. During the initial development of Shishi Marine Biotechnology Park, excessive exploitation caused serious environmental problems that hindered sustainable development, and the park reached its lowest pressure index score (3.097) in 2015. After park managers, governments, and enterprises implemented some sustainability measures, which are heavily weighted in the calculation of the five indices in this indicator system, the comprehensive sustainability score for this park increased significantly, reaching its highest value of 6.173 in 2016. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brine released from desalination plants is extremely high in salinity and contains various chemicals, which are harmful to the ecosystem. The disposal of brine has raised great concerns for the desalination industry around the world due to its detrimental impact on fauna and flora. This review complies with various zero liquid discharge technologies that have been proposed for successful brine disposal which aims to minimize the impact of brine discharge. Moreover, it highlights some of the detrimental impacts of brine discharge on marine fauna and Flora. It also discusses both thermal and membrane technologies for recovering freshwater, energy, and minerals from waste brine, in addition to the recent advances in a solar pond, membrane distillation, pressure retarded osmosis, etc. In Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework was used in this review to analyze the water resource system in Qatar. This review also facilitates and provides a comprehensive approach in minimizing the potential impact of brine discharge which can be practiced and applied in countries where desalination plants are set up. This promotes cleaner production, sustainability, and recycling of waste that will help protect and preserve the country's natural water resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Differences in water resource endowment and socio-economic development of transformed urban agglomerations (TUAs) lead to differences in the ability of cities to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 6 (SDG6), which inevitably underestimates the possibility of water crises. This study employs the water footprint (WF) and reduced water planetary boundary (WPB) as absolute environmental sustainability indicators and uses a drive-pressure-state-impact-response (DPSIR) framework to describe the spatio-temporal differences and evolutionary characteristics of the ability of a TUA to achieve SDG6. This study takes the Guanzhong urban agglomeration (GUA) in China as a case. The WF of GUA increased from 19.55 billion m3 to 23.44 billion m3 in 2007–2018, but it increased initially and then fell. The proportion of the ecological environment WF increased by 1.41%, which is in line with SDG6.4 and SDG6.6. However, WF is larger than WPB. The water deficit was within the interval of [6 billion m3, 23 billion m3]. The pressure subsystems in Tongchuan and Weinan were as high as 28.80%, and the response subsystems in Xi'an and Baoji had the highest weights of 33.79% and 25.84%, respectively. Thus, GUA is under severe water pressure. Causal chain relationships between the socio-economic activities of each city in the water resource system were not the same, reflecting a spatial difference in the ability to achieve SDG6. To this end, this study proposes the potential value and policy implications of reducing the differences in the ability of cities to achieve SDG6 to avoid water crises in TUAs. [Display omitted] ∙ Use DPSIR model to build a framework for water resources sustainability assessment. ∙Narrowing gap in ability of cities to achieve SDG6 can meet new water challenges. ∙Causal chain of human activities and water resources affects ability to achieve SDG6. ∙Water footprint larger than water planetary boundary indicates a water deficit. ∙Cross-regional compensation mechanism can realize sustainable use of water resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban densification is seen as a possible solution in response to the intense urbanization and sustainable development. Urban densification counteracts the negative effects of urban sprawl, which include increased mobility challenges, demand of natural resources, greenhouse gas emissions, and encroachment on green spaces. In spite of its benefits, urban densification creates pressure on the existing buried water infrastructure (BWI) (i.e., drinking water, wastewater, and stormwater) and the environment. The impacts of urban densification on the level of service of BWI are overlooked in the published literature. This study aims to identify and discuss the key drivers, induced pressures, their effects on the level of service, corresponding impacts, and finally the possible responses using the Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) linkage-based sustainability assessment framework. The DPSIR framework was selected due to its simplicity and most powerful communication tool between environment and society. The outcome of this study provide a conceptual model, which interlinks the steps (i) identification of system indicators, (ii) data processing, (iii) decision making, and (iv) impact analysis with factors influencing the integrated level of service of BWI at three different levels. Together these steps create a basis for evaluating the level of service of multifaceted BWI. The uncertainties associated with scenarios, datasets, and model development could be a challenge during the application of proposed conceptual framework. The proposed conceptual model may serve as reference for multi-stakeholders in understanding the dynamic balance between urban densification, BWI, and sustainable use of water services. • DPSIR framework has been adopted to highlight the impacts of urban densification. • Integrated level of service of buried water infrastructure is defined at three levels. • A conceptual model has been developed to assess the integrated level of service. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The evaluation index system of Marine Resources and Environment Carrying Capacity (MRECC) is incomplete and the relationships among indexes are generally neglected, resulting in the unreasonable evaluation results of existing studies. In order to solve this problem, a model named DPPD is established to evaluate the MRECC by innovatively integrating four methods, i.e., DPSIR (Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response), PCA (Principal Component Analysis), PA (Path Analysis), and DEMATEL (Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory). The DPSIR framework is not only employed to identify 26 indexes of MRECC on 5 factors but also provide a possible influence mechanism of factors. The PCA and PA methods are both used to test possible relationships between each pair of factors and determine the effective influence mechanism, based on which the DEMATEL is used to objectively determine the weights of factors for MRECC. The comprehensive evaluation value and contribution rate are defined to reflect the overall performance of MRECC. Finally, the DPPD model is applied on 11 coastal regions of China and some general results are obtained. The weights of factors for MRECC are 0.098 (Driver), 0.176 (Pressure), 0.200 (State), 0.178 (Impact) and 0.348 (Response). The coastal regions of China have exhibited very slight downward trends on the MRECC in recent years but are still unhealthy. In 11 coastal regions of China, 7 are driven by double factors and 4 are driven by multiple factors. • DPPD model is made for evaluating marine resources and environment carrying capacity. • The evaluation index system for MRECC is constructed based on DPSIR framework. • The influence mechanism among factors is tested and determined for MRECC. • DPPD model is applied to evaluate and analyze MRECC for 11 coastal regions of China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]