Revealing Risk Stress on the Lanzhou Section of the Yellow River from the Industries alongside It

Abstract

The precise assessment of environmental risks is significant in the transformation from treatment after pollution towards a precaution and management regime. Herein, we employed the linear combination of the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and Entropy-Weighted (EW) method to exam the impacts of 14 environmental risk factors of 70 enterprises in Lanzhou against the Yellow River aquatic safety. The results showed that enterprises that present a low-risk level to the aquatic safety of the Yellow River accounted for 73% of enterprises, and 27% of enterprises presented a medium level of risk. No enterprise presenting a high level of risk was found. In each administrative district/county, the total value of environmental risks in the Honggu, Xigu, and Anning Districts came to 22.87, 40.51, and 14.17, respectively, due to these districts being the location of a massive number of industries. Furthermore, this study found that the types of enterprises, the species of the risk substance, the shortest distance from the Yellow River, the river′s level, and the population density were the main contributors to the environmental risks. Other issues, such as weak outfall supervision and the shortage of emergency supplies also require increased attention.