累积效应评估(CEA)应在具有生态意义的尺度上进行,例如大型海洋生态系统,以阻止人为压力造成的进一步海洋退化,并促进基于生态系统的管理,例如跨界海洋空间规划(MSP)。然而,在大型海洋生态系统尺度上的研究很少,尤其是在西太平洋海域,各国有不同的MSP进程,但跨界合作至关重要。因此,逐步的CEA将提供信息,以帮助邻国设定共同目标。在基于风险的CEA框架的基础上,我们将CEA分解为风险识别和空间明确风险分析,并将其应用于黄海大海洋生态系统(YSLME),旨在了解最具影响力的因果途径和风险分布规律。结果表明:(1)包括港口在内的七项人类活动,海水养殖,钓鱼,工业和城市发展,航运,能源,和海岸防御,和三种压力,包括海底的物理损失,有害物质的输入,氮,和磷的富集是YSLME环境问题的主要原因;(2)底栖生物,鱼,藻类,潮汐公寓,海鸟,和海洋哺乳动物是最脆弱的生态系统组成部分,累积效应对其起作用;(3)风险相对较高的地区主要集中在近岸地区,尤其是山东,辽宁,苏北,而韩国沿海海湾也见证了高风险;(4)在跨界地区可以观察到某些风险,其原因是普遍的捕鱼,航运,由于气旋循环和细粒沉积物,该地区的污染物下沉。在未来关于MSP的跨界合作中,应纳入风险标准和对现有管理措施的评估,以确定已识别的风险是否超过可接受的水平,并确定下一步的合作。我们的研究提供了大型海洋生态系统尺度的CEA示例,并为西太平洋和其他地区的其他大型海洋生态系统提供了参考。
Cumulative effects assessment (CEA) should be conducted at ecologically meaningful scales such as large marine ecosystems to halt further ocean degradation caused by anthropogenic pressures and facilitate ecosystem-based management such as transboundary marine spatial planning (MSP). However, few studies exist at large marine ecosystems scale, especially in the West Pacific seas, where countries have different MSP processes yet transboundary cooperation is paramount. Thus, a step-wise CEA would be informative to help bordering countries set a common goal. Building on the risk-based CEA framework, we decomposed CEA into risk identification and spatially-explicit risk analysis and applied it to the Yellow Sea Large Marine Ecosystem (YSLME), aiming to understand the most influential cause-effect pathways and risk distribution pattern. The results showed that (1) seven human activities including port, mariculture, fishing, industry and urban development, shipping, energy, and coastal defence, and three pressures including physical loss of seabed, input of hazardous substances, nitrogen, and phosphorus enrichment were the leading causes of environmental problems in the YSLME; (2) benthic organisms, fishes, algae, tidal flats, seabirds, and marine mammals were the most vulnerable ecosystem components on which cumulative effects acted; (3) areas with relatively high risk mainly concentrated on nearshore zones, especially Shandong, Liaoning, and northern Jiangsu, while coastal bays of South Korea also witnessed high risk; (4) certain risks could be observed in the transboundary area, of which the causes were the pervasive fishing, shipping, and sinking of pollutants in this area due to the cyclonic circulation and fine-grained sediments. In future transboundary cooperation on MSP, risk criteria and evaluation of existing management measures should be incorporated to determine whether the identified risk has exceeded the acceptable level and identify the next step of cooperation. Our study presents an example of CEA at large marine ecosystems scale and provides a reference to other large marine ecosystems in the West Pacific and elsewhere.