Research on marine ecological carrying capacity based on system dynamics:a case study of Huizhou city

This paper, taking Huizhou city as an example, built an evaluation index system of marine ecological carrying capacity which is divided into three target layers as pressure class, supportive class and regional exchanges class, and includes seven criteria layers as population, economic development, environmental pollution and resource use, resource supply capacity, environmental carrying capacity, human social support and product exchange.State-space model is applied to conduct quantitative evaluation to the bearing capacity of marine ecological situation in Huizhou city from 2004 to 2013.The results show that the marine ecological carrying capacity of Huizhou fluctuated from year to year; some years were overloading.From 2004 to 2008, environmental pollution and resource use had been the main pressure on marine ecosystems; since 2009, economic development had become the main pressure.The supportive level was generally stable and increasingly improving.According to the prediction by system dynamics model, bearing capacity index of marine ecology will rise year by year in the current mode of development, due to rapid economic growth, wastewater emissions and solid waste generation; overloaded phenomenon will appear from 2018 to 2020.In order to ensure that the marine ecological carrying capacity can be contained within proper range, Huizhou needs to accelerate the process of urbanization and use intensive growth method to reduce economic growth rate and improve the treatment rate of pollutants.