Land cover and drought risk assessment in Türkiye’s mountain regions using neutrosophic decision support system

• Published in: Environmental monitoring and assessment Vol. 196; no. 11; p. 1046
• Main Authors: Atesoglu, Ayhan, Ayyildiz, Ertugrul, Karakaya, Irem, Bulut, Fidan Sevval, Serengil, Yusuf
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 01.11.2024; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Alpine environments; Analytic hierarchy process; Archives & records; Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution; Climate Change; Cloud computing; Conservation of Natural Resources - methods; Data collection; Datasets; Decision making; Decision support systems; Decision Support Techniques; Drought; Droughts; Earth and Environmental Science; Ecological risk assessment; Ecology; Ecosystem; Ecosystems; Ecotoxicology; Environment; Environmental impact; Environmental Management; Environmental Monitoring - methods; Environmental risk; Evaluation; Evapotranspiration; Human influences; humans; Hybridization; Land cover; Land degradation; Land use; land use and land cover maps; Mapping; Mitigation; Monitoring/Environmental Analysis; Mountain ecosystems; Mountain regions; Mountainous areas; Mountains; normalized difference vegetation index; Normalized difference vegetative index; Open source software; Parameter identification; Parameters; Precipitation; Public domain; Remote sensing; Remote Sensing Technology; risk; Risk Assessment; Satellites; Spatial data; temperature; Turkey; Vegetation index; Water deficit; Turkey; Mountainous areas; Neutrosophic logic; Multiple criteria decision-making; Drought
• ISSN: 0167-6369; 1573-2959; 1573-2959
• DOI: 10.1007/s10661-024-13155-3

Earth observation (EO) provides dynamic scientific methods for tracking and defining ecological parameters in mountainous regions. Open-source platforms are frequently utilized in this context to efficiently collect and evaluate spatial data. In this study, we used Collect Earth (CE), an open-source land monitoring platform, to reveal and assess land cover, land cover change, and relevant ecological parameters such as drought risk. Mountain ecosystems were subject to an evaluation for the first time by combining remote sensing with a hybridization of Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL), analytic hierarchy process (AHP), and Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) for neutrosophic sets in risk assessment problems of several connected criteria. The high and dispersed high alpine environment of Türkiye accommodates land with relatively less human influence, making it suitable to observe climate change impacts. In the framework of the study, we evaluated more than two decades (2000–2022) of land use and land cover (LULC) changes in the mountain regions of the country. Using nine identified ecological parameters, we also evaluated drought risk. The parameters included were the LULC classes and their change, elevation, slope, aspect, precipitation, temperature, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), water deficit, and evapotranspiration (ET). The risk map we produced revealed a high to very high drought risk for almost throughout the Türkiye’s mountainous areas. We concluded that integrating geospatial techniques with hybridization is promising for mapping drought risk, helping policymakers prepare effective drought mitigation measures to reasonably adapt to climate change impacts.