Application of the DPSIR model in marine ecological environmental assessment

ABSTRACT This study applies the DPSIR (Driving Forces-Pressure-State-Impact-Response) framework to evaluate the ecological safety of Anping Port, Taiwan, from 2015 to 2021. Using time series data, the study identifies key indicators, including water transparency, nitrogen oxides, and fuel oil consumption, that significantly affect the port's ecological health. The DPSIR model highlights the dominance of ‘Environmental policy,' ‘Environmental quality,' and ‘Emergency improvement' as critical factors, with pollution control policies contributing 19.79% to the overall weight of the evaluation. Of the total weight, ‘Environmental quality' accounts for 14.9%, ‘Emergency improvement' accounts for 14.58%. The research findings reveal that Anping Port's ecological safety exhibited a ‘U'-shaped trend, declining from 2015 to 2017, but gradually improving through 2021, largely due to emergency governmental interventions. The entropy method further ranks ‘Advice for Improvement' and ‘Number of notifications' as the most influential indicators, underscoring the importance of timely management actions. The weight of ‘Advice for Improvement' was 7.36%, and the weight for ‘Number of notifications’ was 7.22%. This model provides a comprehensive foundation for future marine protection policies, particularly in designing conservation areas and strengthening ecological safety protocols.