Environmental monitoring of urban ecosystems: development of a comprehensive system of indicators for the sustainable development of megacities
Keywords:
environmental monitoring, urban ecosystems, sustainable development, environmental quality indicatorsAbstract
Rapid urbanization and the accompanying anthropogenic transformation of natural ecosystems necessitate the development of effective environmental monitoring systems for the urban environment that integrate heterogeneous data into a single analytical platform. The present study is aimed at developing and validating a comprehensive system of indicators for the sustainable development of megacities, taking into account the multidimensional nature of urban ecosystems and the specifics of their functioning under conditions of intense anthropogenic stress. The paper analyzes existing approaches to environmental monitoring of urban areas, identifies their methodological limitations, and proposes an integrative concept that combines biotic, abiotic, and socio-economic parameters. Based on the data obtained during a three-year study of 18 large cities representing different climatic zones and levels of economic development, a system of 32 interrelated indicators grouped into 5 functional clusters has been developed and verified. The results of the approbation of the proposed system demonstrate high predictive ability (R2=0.87) and resistance to variability of the initial data (coefficient of variation 0.12). The application of the developed methodology made it possible to identify critical areas of environmental vulnerability of the studied megacities and formulate targeted recommendations for optimizing their sustainable development strategies. The proposed system of indicators significantly increases the information content and accuracy of environmental monitoring of urbanized territories, ensuring the integration of multi-scale data and creating a basis for making informed management decisions in the field of urban planning and environmental safety.
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