A simulation-based approach for assessing regional and industrial flood vulnerability using mixed-MRIO model: A case study of Hubei Province, China

Quantifying the direct and indirect impacts of urban waterlogging using input‒output analysis

Increasingly frequent urban waterlogging disasters are having profound social and economic consequences. An appropriate and integrated evaluation of the total economic impacts of such disasters is crucial for achieving effective urban disaster risk management and sustainable development. However, existing metrics are inadequate for measuring the economic impacts of rainfall events of different intensities and their ripple effects across regions. Moreover, their ecological impacts have received insufficient attention. To address these gaps, we developed an integrated assessment framework for analyzing urban waterlogging losses and evaluating their various impacts. Taking Beijing as a case study, we used the InfoWorks ICM model to simulate urban waterlogging disaster risks, quantified direct economic losses, and assessed their environmental impacts. Additionally, we estimated indirect economic losses using input-output analysis and explored spillover effects. The results revealed increasing trends of direct economic losses and environmental losses corresponding to a longer return period. We observed synergies between these losses and their spatial heterogeneity. However, indirect impacts far outweighed direct impacts, with the former being 2.43 times larger than the latter. The cascading effect resulting from damage to infrastructure was also particularly pronounced. The industrial and spatial heterogeneity of interregional impacts was striking, with eastern provinces evidencing the most significant effects. By mapping the transmission paths of disaster losses along industrial chains and across regions, this study provides inputs that could assist policymakers in developing more effective measures for preventing and mitigating urban waterlogging disasters.

Reveal the inequality hidden in industry land use by integrating domestic trade and the industry efficiency

Although industrial land accounts for a low percentage of the land surface, it can significantly affect the development of the economy and the environment. Unbalanced development makes industry efficiency differ vastly across China. Industry products embodied in domestic trade link the indirect use of industry inputs and outputs. Regional inequality needs to be more scientifically checked by comprehensively considering both trade and the efficiency, which may be determined by diverse indices. Accordingly, this study examined industrial land use among provinces and the efficiency, identified the embodied land, developed approaches to ascertain how industrial land use would change without domestic trade, and revealed the inequalities in industrial land by considering the trade. Results found that provinces along China's coastline usually have a highly industrialised area, and the developed regions usually have high efficiency. Guangdong, Henan, Jiangsu, Shanghai, Shandong, Liaoning, Anhui, Hebei, and Heilongjiang have high values in both industrial land serving external provinces and the reverse use in external provinces. Through domestic trade, China saved a total of 462 km2 of land to be converted into industrial land, which is mainly due to developed regions providing industrial land use to undeveloped regions with low efficiency. The inequality analysis shows that most provinces were in a moderate state. Heilongjiang, Gansu, and Guangxi have obvious disadvantages. Some suggestions have been made for harmonious industry development and enhanced efficiency, such as the implementation of efficiency and price-based land use policies, industry and energy structure optimisation, technological improvement, and appropriate compensation.