Subsidence Monitoring and Driving-Factor Analysis of China’s Coastal Belt Based on SBAS-InSAR

Wei Fa, Hongsong Wang, Wenliang Liu, Hongxian Chu () and Yuqiang Wu
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Wei Fa: Yantai Center of Coastal Zone Geological Survey, China Geological Survey, Yantai 264000, China
Hongsong Wang: Yantai Center of Coastal Zone Geological Survey, China Geological Survey, Yantai 264000, China
Wenliang Liu: Yantai Center of Coastal Zone Geological Survey, China Geological Survey, Yantai 264000, China
Hongxian Chu: Yantai Center of Coastal Zone Geological Survey, China Geological Survey, Yantai 264000, China
Yuqiang Wu: Yantai Maritime Safety Administration, Yantai 264000, China

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 21, 1-18

Abstract: China’s sinuous coastline is increasingly threatened by land subsidence driven by complex geological conditions and intensive human activity. Using year-round Sentinel-1A acquisitions for 2023 and SBAS-InSAR processing, we generated the first millimetre-resolution subsidence velocity field covering the 50 km coastal buffer of mainland China. We elucidated subsidence patterns and their drivers and quantified the associated socio-economic risks by integrating 1 km GDP and population data. Our analysis shows that ~55.77% of the coastal zone is subsiding, exposing 97.42 million residents and CNY 16.41 billion of GDP. Four hotspots—Laizhou Bay, northern Jiangsu, the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) and the Pearl River Delta (PRD)—exhibit the most pronounced deformation. Over-extraction of groundwater is identified as the primary driver. The 15 m resolution subsidence product provides an up-to-date, high-precision dataset that effectively supports sustainable development research in coastal hazard prevention, territorial spatial planning, and sea-level rise studies.

Keywords: land subsidence; coastal zone of China; SBAS-InSAR; sentinel-1A; human activity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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