Ecological vulnerability assessment of geological disaster-prone areas: a case study of Shanyang County in Shaanxi Province, China

College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Northwest University, 710127 Xi’an, China

^* Corresponding author: Email: leetang@nwu.edu.cn

Abstract

The geological environment in Qinling-Dabashan Areas is fragile due to Meteorological and hydrological conditions, topographic features, geological structures, stratum lithology and human activities. This article selected Shanyang County, a disaster-prone area in Qinling-Dabashan Areas, as the study area, based on the analysis of present situation and the driving factors of the ecological vulnerability, and selected 16 indicators to construct the evaluation index system from three aspects sensitivity, resilience and pressure. The results show that: The proportion of areas with moderate vulnerability and above in Shanyang County is 61.4%, and the overall ecological vulnerability is at a moderate to high level. Severe and extremely vulnerable areas are obviously geologically neutral, mainly distributed in the northern, central and northern regions and the central and eastern regions. Areas with high ecological vulnerability are concentrated in rivers with frequent human activities and low mountain areas with serious soil erosion. The ecological vulnerability in the east is higher than that in the west; in north-south direction, it is inverted U-shaped, and the south is slightly higher than the north; the central ecological vulnerability is the highest throughout the region.