Comprehensive vulnerability assessment for environmental facility depending on spatial characteristics in South Korea

Abstract

Among environmental facilities, wastewater treatment facilities have a crucial role in sustaining human life, and any occurrence of an earthquake or flood within these facilities can result in various social, economic, and environmental issues, either directly or indirectly. Therefore, a quantitative vulnerability assessment of wastewater treatment facilities is necessary to minimize and prevent damage from earthquakes and flood disasters. For this reason, this study introduces a novel indicator to assess the susceptibility of disasters, considering aspects of exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity. The newly proposed indicator encompasses numerous evaluation criteria, topography, natural surroundings, hydraulic systems, structural composition, and non-structural features. Also, Weights derived using the combined weight calculation (CWC) method, which combined the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and entropy weight method were applied to the indicator. It was tested across 23 cities to validate its efficacy, revealing a substantial correlation between the vulnerability index and the specific attributes of the city's wastewater treatment facilities. Therefore, this study analyzed wastewater treatment facilities by comparing the attributes of the urban areas under investigation, such as topological characteristics, urbanization levels, population density, infrastructure quality, and disaster preparedness resources available. The suggested methodology can facilitate the development of strategies aimed at averting damage caused by earthquakes or floods and reducing the adverse impact on wastewater treatment facilities while considering the unique characteristics of the urban setting in question.