Assessment of the Quality of the Environment in Duhok Province, Kurdistan Region of Iraq
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.38094/jocef119Keywords:
environmental quality, environmental indicators, GIS, DuhokAbstract
Analyzing the quality of the environment is essential because it directly affects public health status and plays a significant role in the quality of life. This research aimed to evaluate the environmental quality of human-made factors in Duhok province using available data and geographic information systems. Population density, solid waste generation, and the location and density of the industrial units were considered and evaluated as the main anthropogenic factors affecting the quality of the environment in the study area. The overall result indicated that 28% and 58% of the study area has a moderate and high-quality state (suitable level), respectively. While low and very low classes involved only 14% (unsuitable level) mostly found in the southern regions and the province's capital. However, the low portion of the unsuitable situation highlighted this point that the province's capital and other main cities such as Zakho, Akre, and Semel had inappropriate environment quality and should be taken into more consideration. The integrated analysis of the environmental quality in Duhok province would increase the protection of the ecological environment and help the regional sustainable development and improvement of the quality of the environment.
References
A. Li, A. Wang, S. Liang, and W. Zhou, “eco-environmental vulnerability evaluation in the mountainous region using remote sensing and GIS—a case study in the upper reaches of Minjiang River, China,” Ecol. Model., vol. 192, no. 1–2, pp. 175–187, 2006.
G. Aad et al., “Observation of a new particle in the search for the Standard Model Higgs boson with the ATLAS detector at the LHC,” Phys. Lett. B, vol. 716, no. 1, pp. 1–29, 2012.
L. T. Tran, R. V. O’Neill, and E. R. Smith, “Spatial pattern of environmental vulnerability in the Mid-Atlantic region, USA,” Appl. Geogr., vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 191–202, 2010.
R. Aretano, T. Semeraro, I. Petrosillo, A. De Marco, M. R. Pasimeni, and G. Zurlini, “Mapping ecological vulnerability to fire for effective conservation management of natural protected areas,” Ecol. Model., vol. 295, pp. 163–175, 2015.
Y. Chen, J. Yu, and S. Khan, “Spatial sensitivity analysis of multi-criteria weights in GIS-based land suitability evaluation,” Environ. Model. Softw., vol. 25, no. 12, pp. 1582–1591, 2010.
K. Schotten, R. Goetgeluk, M. Hilferink, P. Rietveld, and H. Scholten, “Residential construction, land use and the environment. Simulations for the Netherlands using a GIS-based land use model,” Environ. Model. Assess., vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 133–143, 2001.
H. Karimi, A. Soffianian, N. Mirghaffari, and S. Soltani, “Determining air pollution potential using geographic information systems and multi-criteria evaluation: A case study in Isfahan province in Iran,” Environ. Process., vol. 3, no. 1, pp. 229–246, 2016.
H. Lan, C. Zhou, L. Wang, H. Zhang, and R. Li, “Landslide hazard spatial analysis and prediction using GIS in the Xiaojiang watershed, Yunnan, China,” Eng. Geol., vol. 76, no. 1–2, pp. 109–128, 2004.
A. J. Cohen et al., “Estimates and 25-year trends of the global burden of disease attributable to ambient air pollution: an analysis of data from the Global Burden of Diseases Study 2015,” The Lancet, vol. 389, no. 10082, pp. 1907–1918, 2017.
H. Karimi, J. Jafarnezhad, K. Khaledi,. et al. Monitoring and prediction of land use/land cover changes using CA-Markov model: a case study of Ravansar County in Iran. Arab J Geosci 11, 592 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-018-3940-5.
A. Kourosh Niya,, J. Huang, H Karimi, H, H. Keshtkar, B Naimi. Use of Intensity Analysis to Characterize Land Use/Cover Change in the Biggest Island of Persian Gulf, Qeshm Island, Iran. Sustainability 2019, 11, 4396.
Ali, S.A., Ahmad, A. Suitability analysis for municipal landfill site selection using fuzzy analytic hierarchy process and geospatial technique. Environ Earth Sci 79, 227 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-020-08970-z
H. Karimi, B. M. Herki, S. Q. Gardi, S. Galali, H. Hossini, K. Mirzaei & M. Pirsaheb (2020) Site selection and environmental risks assessment of medical solid waste landfill for the City of Kermanshah-Iran, International Journal of Environmental Health Research, DOI: 10.1080/09603123.2020.1742876
Governorship of Duhok, 2019, Number of populations in Duhok province.
Duhok Environment Department, 2019, number and locations of the industrial units.
Duhok Municipality,2019, Rate of solid waste generation in Duhok province.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License [CC BY-NC-SA 4.0] that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work, with an acknowledgment of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online.
