Identification of the ＂source＂ and ＂sink＂ patterns influencing non-point source pollution in the Three Gorges Reservoir Area

• Published in: Journal of geographical sciences 2016-10, Vol.26 (10), p.1431-1448
• Main Authors: Wang, Jinliang, Shao, Jing’an, Wang, Dan, Ni, Jiupai, Xie, Deti
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Canyons; Earth and Environmental Science; Geographical Information Systems/Cartography; Geography; Hydrology; Land use; Landscape; Nature Conservation; Nonpoint source pollution; Outlets; Physical Geography; Point source pollution; Remote Sensing/Photogrammetry; Reservoirs; Spatial distribution; 三峡库区; 动力系数; 土地利用; 成本模型; 景观元素; 景观格局指数; 生态环境; 非点源污染
• ISSN: 1009-637X; 1861-9568
• DOI: 10.1007/s11442-016-1336-6

Non-point source pollution is one of the primarily ecological issues affecting the Three Gorges Reservoir Area. In this paper, landscape resistance and motivation coefficient, which integrated various landscape elements, such as land use, soil, hydrology, topography, and vegetation, was established based on the effects of large-scale resistance and motivation on the formation of non-point source pollution. In addition, cost models of the landscape re- sistance and motivation coefficients were constructed based on the distances from the land- scape units to the sub-basin outlets in order to identify the ＂source＂ and ＂sink＂ patterns af- fecting the formation of non-point source pollution. The results indicated that the changes in the landscape resistance and motivation coefficients of the 16 sub-basins exhibited inverse relationships to their spatial distributions. The landscape resistance and motivation cost curves were more volatile than the landscape resistance and motivation coefficient curves. The landscape resistance and motivation cost trends of the 16 sub-basins became increas- ingly apparent along the flow of the Yangtze River. The landscape resistance and motivation cost models proposed in this paper could be used to identify large-scale non-point source pollution ＂source＂ and ＂sink＂ patterns. Moreover, the proposed model could be used to de- scribe the large-scale spatial characteristics of non-point source pollution formation based on ＂source＂ and ＂sink＂ landscape pattern indices, spatial localization, and landscape resistance and motivation coefficients.