1196 The integrated simulations suggest that quarry-derived particulate matter may influence marine environments beyond immediate coastal zones, highlighting the potential for regional-scale impacts from localized quarrying activities. Fine particles may contribute to increased turbidity, sedimentation stress, and degradation of sensitive coastal and benthic ecosystems. Given the ecological importance of the Galápagos Islands, these cross-domain transport pathways should be carefully considered in environmental management and regulatory decision-making. The developed digital twin platform offers a practical tool for visualizing and quantifying such risks. Several limitations should be acknowledged. The present model neglects explicit three-dimensional turbulent diffusion, resuspension, and particle aggregation processes, and particle properties were assumed to be constant. In addition, the analysis focused primarily on cold-season conditions characterized by stable transport pathways. Future studies should incorporate fully three-dimensional circulation models, stochastic diffusion schemes, and field observations to further constrain particle behavior and improve long-term impact assessments. Nevertheless, this study demonstrates the feasibility and effectiveness of integrated land–sea digital twin approaches for environmental impact evaluation in data-limited island environments. 5. CONCLUSIONS This study developed an integrated land–sea digital twin framework to evaluate the dispersion of quarry-derived particulate matter in the Galápagos Islands. By combining atmospheric reanalysis data, particle settling theory, ocean circulation modeling, and three-dimensional geospatial visualization, the proposed approach enabled comprehensive analysis of cross-domain transport processes in a small island environment. Seasonal wind analysis indicates that cold-season southeasterly trade winds provide relatively stable and predictable offshore transport directions, whereas warm-season conditions are highly variable. Particle size is a key control on both atmospheric residence time and marine dispersion: PM10-equivalent particles (10 μm) show long residence times and wider transport ranges, including modelled trajectories reaching the nearshore waters of neighbouring islands, whereas 30 μm particles remain largely confined to nearshore waters. The adopted two-dimensional Lagrangian particle tracking model, combined with mixed-layer residence time estimates, provided a physically consistent first-order approximation for near-surface marine advection following atmospheric deposition. Integrating multi-domain outputs into a 3D GIS-based digital twin enables rapid visual screening of transport corridors and potential receptor areas, supporting transparent communication of assumptions and uncertainty. The results indicate that localized quarrying activities can potentially generate regionally distributed impacts in sensitive island ecosystems, particularly via fine-particle transport. The proposed framework offers a practical and transferable tool for supporting screening-level environmental impact assessment and mitigation planning in data-limited island environments. Future extensions that include three-dimensional circulation, turbulent diffusion and field observations will be needed to quantify exposure and risk with higher confidence ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The researchers would like to acknowledge the Science and Technology Research Partnership for Sustainable Development (SATREPS), Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST)/Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) for the support to the Japan-Kazakhstan SATREPS Knight Project during this research.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTM0Mzk2