Abstract: Regional water environmental carrying capacity (WECC) is of crucial significance for the formulation of sustainable development policy. In line with the current situation of water environment in Enshi Prefecture, 15 indexes in regards to society, resource environment, and economy were selected to constitute an index system for evaluating WECC. In association with the spatial analysis function of geographic information system(GIS), the subjective and objective weights of each index were given using the sum of deviation square, and each index was rasterized and superimposed in GIS to obtain the quantitative value of WECC and the spatial distribution map of WECC of Enshi Prefecture in 2017. Results suggest that the overall WECC of Enshi Prefecture is at a moderate level. The area proportion with WECC of 5 grades (excellent, good, moderate, inferior, and very inferior) is 1.23%, 27.24%, 42.62%, 19.17%, and 9.74%, respectively. The WECCs of Laifeng, Xuanen, and Hefeng counties are the highest, and those of Jianshi, Badong and Xianfeng are slightly lower, while the WECCs of Lichuan and Enshi are the most inferior.

Key words: water environmental carrying capacity(WECC), geographic information system(GIS), sum of deviation square, combinatorial weighting, Enshi Prefecture