Risk assessment of floor water inrush based on TOPSIS combined weighting model: a case study in a coal mine, China

This paper presents a novel water inrush risk index (WIRI) evaluation model based on principal component analysis (PCA), criteria importance though inter-criteria correlation (CRITIC) and technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution (TOPSIS). Treating Xinyugou coal mine as the study area, the water inrush risk of coal mining on confined water was evaluated. Seven factors were selected to construct the water inrush evaluation system. The PCA, the CRITIC and the kullback information concept (KIC) were adopted to determine the combination weights of water inrush evaluation indicators. Combined with the TOPSIS method, a WIRI evaluation model was constructed. Also, the geographic information system (GIS) was used to partition the water inrush risk in the study area. The results show that the PCA and the CRITIC were applied in the determination of each evaluation index weight, ensuring the objective presentation of the original information included in the evaluation indicators. Meanwhile, the KIC ensured the scientific construction of combination weight without the occurrence of the weight bias phenomenon; the prediction accuracy of WIRI evaluation model is more than 90%, with a good fitting effect with the actual water inrush points. Compared with the water inrush coefficient method, the model, with five regions classified in the study area, can more intuitively reflect the water inrush risk of each region. This model has a guiding role in preventing water inrush from coal seam floor above confined water.