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The water resources in the inland river basin of the Hexi have been seriously imbalanced due to human activities and social development. Although many studies have established evaluation systems for water resources carrying capacity, research on a comprehensive analysis of the spatio-temporal heterogeneity of carrying capacity from a policy perspective is still relatively scarce due to cross-disciplinary and cross-field limitations.Therefore, this study adheres to the "Four Waters and Four Determinations" principle, constructs system dynamics models for the three major river basins of Shiyang River, Heihe River, and Shule River, adopts the "3+4" research paradigm, focuses on the three subsystems of water resources, economy and society, and ecological environment, sets up four development scenarios including the status quo continuation development type (S1), economic priority development type (S2), resource conservation development type (S3), and comprehensive development type (S4). It also employs a TOPSIS model based on game theory combination weighting and improved grey relational degree for evaluation and prediction.Research findings indicate: (1) During the forecast period from 2024 to 2030, the total carrying capacity of the three major river basins shows a significant upward trend, and by 2030, all will have reached a weakly bearable level (C > 0.5). For the same year, the carrying capacity magnitudes across the four development scenarios are ranked as follows: S3 > S4 > S1 > S2.(2) The carrying capacity of the water resources subsystem shows an overall downward trend. In the future, the Heihe River Basin and the Shule River Basin will be in a severely overloaded state. It is necessary to focus on governance from aspects such as total water consumption, irrigation water for farmland, and sewage treatment.(3) S3 Scenario has achieved remarkable results in various fields such as industry, agriculture, and domestic water use, significantly reducing the total water consumption. In contrast, although S2 Scenario helps to increase GDP and promote economic growth, it will also increase the total water consumption, which is not conducive to the intensive and economical use of water resources. Therefore, S3 Scenario is the optimal solution for achieving sustainable water resource utilization.The research results can provide a scientific basis for the sustainable development of water resources in the Hexi inland river basin and other similar basins.
Du et al. (Tue,) studied this question.