A total environmental risk assessment model for international hub airports

This paper presents a multi-criteria decision analysis for environmental risk assessment (ERA) with regard to avoiding and eliminating damages and loss under natural disasters in international airport projects. It starts from an assumption that the strategy of eliminating damages and losses under natural disasters is related to the location selection problem, and it is necessary to use the multi-criteria decision analysis for calculated decision-making support. The paper uses the analytic network process (ANP) to demonstrate one of its utility modes in decision-making support to location selection problems, which aims at an evaluation of different projects from different locations. A set of generic criteria for risk assessment at international projects was put forward to support ANP modelling, and it was due to the consideration of social, technical, economic, environmental and political (STEEP) criteria related to the built, social and natural (BSN) trinity environment of international airport projects. At the end, an experimental case study on three international hub airports in China is given to test the ANP model called ERA.Airport, and it is concluded that ANP can be effectively used for risk assessment in the specific utility mode. The ERA.Airport is a generic multi-criteria decision-making model and can be used across the world for accurate environmental risk assessment for international airports. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. and IPMA. All rights reserved.