The ecologically vulnerable regions in Northwest China were identified as key potential areas for renewable energy development. The synergistic advancement between establishing new energy bases and implementing comprehensive land consolidation was considered a crucial strategy for promoting high-quality development in these fragile ecosystems. This study, which took Qilian County in Qinghai Province as the research area, developed an ecological sensitivity assessment model based on topographic, soil, and ecological factors. A suitability evaluation model for photovoltaic (PV) base construction was also established, incorporating energy resources, infrastructure conditions, and landscape structure. A systematic analysis was conducted to assess the regional ecological sensitivity, the suitability for PV base construction, as well as the coordinated development level of the two aspects. Based on the coupling coordination degree model, the photovoltaic base construction type areas were classified to promote the layout of the new energy industry and the comprehensive land consolidation in a coordinated manner. The findings revealed that: 1) The overall ecological sensitivity in Qilian County was relatively high, showing a general pattern of "higher in the west and lower in the east." Townships such as Yanglong and Yeniugou exhibited particularly high sensitivity. Conversely, the suitability for PV base construction demonstrated a "high in the north and south, low in the center" pattern, with higher suitability concentrated in towns like Mole and Ebao. 2) Using the coupling coordination degree model, Qilian County was categorized into four adaptive type areas. The high-quality coordination zone (2734.70 km²), located in areas including Mole Town and Arong Township, was prioritized for PV base development, where the "pastoral-photovoltaic complementary model" could be developed, and ecological protection and restoration work should have been emphasized before and after construction. The good coordination zone (2690.57 km²), found in parts of Yanglong and Yeniugou Townships, where the "pastoral-photovoltaic complementary model" and "photovoltaic + agricultural model" could be developed, and the regional ecological environment was generally in good condition; however, pollution of the water areas within the basin should be prevented and soil and water conservation work should be done well. The moderate coordination zone (1150.54 km²), distributed across parts of Yanglong Township and Mole Town, had high ecological sensitivity and significant constraints for solar energy exploitation, necessitating a priority on ecological protection and only moderate PV development. The barely coordinated zone (374.18 km²), located in areas like Yanglong Township, was strictly limited for development; Priority should be given to natural restoration, supplemented by necessary ecological restoration projects in a timely manner. This study provided a methodological framework for integrating new energy industry development with land restoration efforts in ecologically vulnerable regions.

67 million hectares of high-standard farmland has been constructed in China by the end of 2022. The production quality and capacity of these farmland need to be upgraded after long-time utilization, low investment, and disaster damage. The next construction is required for the food security. However, there is seldom report so far. This study aims to optimize the projects and then upgrade the high-standard farmland using TOPSIS and coupling coordination degree. Taking the Laoling City, Shandong Province as the research area, 87.93% of field was built into the high-standard farmland from 2013 to 2022. The evaluation index system was constructed from three aspects: construction foundation, fertility quality and water resource utilization. 14 indicators were contained, such as farmland area, building time, cost input, road accessibility, field breakage degree, soil organic matter, soil P, soil K, salinity degree, soil texture, water quantity, pond density, ditch density and water system connectivity. Furthermore, 57 688.44 hm² high-standard farmland from 950 administrative villages were taken as the evaluation unit to realize the implicative construction. The AHP (analytic hierachy process) and TOPSIS (technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution) analysis were chosen to evaluate the current situation as functional effectiveness of facilities, potential to arable land productivity and sustainable utilization of water resources. The production capacity of farmland was also evaluated to determine the coupling coordination degree for the cooperativity among three aspects. The upgrading project areas were delimited using the cooperativity index and spatial patterns. The results show that: 1) The construction foundation was relatively superior in the southwest and eastern regions, while the weak performance distributed mainly in the south and central regions. High fertility areas were accounted for a small proportion of 14.46% in the central, southern and northeast regions. Water resources presented a trend of high in the central region and low in the northern and southern regions. 2) The coupling coordination index of the three dimensions were ranged from 0.41 to 0.85. The high values were clustered in the southwest, east and northeast, whereas, the low values were in the south and northwest, and the median cross-distributed in the central and southern regions. 3) According to the coupling coordination degree index, the information and pertinency target, the evaluation units were broadly classified as near-term, mid-term and long-term construction sequences, where the areas of each period were 8 633.23, 11 004.64 and 9 102.62 hm², respectively. According to spatial pattern, three sequences were divided into 12 upgrading projects with the average stage of 4 projects. Different obstruction factors were optimized to improve the quality and efficiency of each project, in term of water source security, facilities, fund integration, land capacity and structural improvement. The construction quality and operation period of high-standard farmland were considered to balance the land use with productivity degradation. The optimal configuration was achieved under the constraint of water resources, following the principle of coordination and adaptation to local conditions. Thus the finding can also provide a strong reference to select the priority areas for the high-standard farmland.