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The spatiotemporal distribution of ecosystem service values (ESVs) and ecological risk are critical indicators to represent the regional ecological protection level and potential of sustainable development, which largely depend on land-use patterns. Aiming to contribute to global climate mitigation, China has proposed dual-carbon goals that would remarkably influence the land-use/cover change (LUCC) distribution. Based on the Landsat land cover data of 2000, 2010 and 2020 and multisource satellite products, several driving factors are integrated into the patch-generating land use simulation (PLUS) model to simulate future LUCC patterns for the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) under rapid urbanization, cropland protection and carbon neutral (CN) scenarios from 2020 to 2050. Spatial–temporal ecosystem service and ESVs are allocated using INVEST and the equivalent factor method and thus ecological risks are evaluated using the entropy method. Results indicate that forest growth is the largest under the CN scenario, especially in the northwestern and northeastern GBA, exceeding 25,800 km2 in 2050, which results in both the highest habitat quality and carbon storage. The largest ESVs, reaching higher than 5210 yuan/pixel, are found in the CN scenario, particularly expanding toward the suburban area, leading to the lowest ecological risks. From 2020 to 2050, habitat quality, carbon storage and ESVs improve, while ecological risks decline in the CN scenario. This research provides implications for economic and ecological balanced development and gives references to the carbon-neutral pathway for the GBA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid urban expansion, accompanied by intense landscape changes, significantly affects natural habitats. Promoting sustainable urban development, such as the compact city strategy, is essential to balance ecosystem conservation and socio-economic development. Previous studies have generally focused on exploring the ecosystem impact of urban expansion concerning the future projections of climate, population, and economic development. Less attention has been paid to how different urban forms modify the landscape and affect habitats at a fine resolution. This study has built a framework to demonstrate future land use change under various city compaction scenarios using a bottom-up Cellular Automata (CA) model and a top-down Markov model. Then the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Trade-offs (InVEST) model was incorporated to evaluate the resultant habitat quality. By taking the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) as the study area, three future compact city scenarios in 2040 and 2060 were proposed to examine the accumulative effect of urban growth. The results show that by 2040, the high-compact scenario will cause the highest habitat quality degradation among all scenarios due to marked cropland displacement induced by urban edge expansion. By 2060, intensified medium or low-compact scenarios tend to create new urban clusters outside the existing urban areas, resulting in severe habitat isolation and fragmentation. The GBA presents significant spatial heterogeneity in habitat quality variation because of the uneven development between the core and key node cities. Our results suggest that a collaborative strategy should be promoted to motivate the unique advantages of each city. This could include maintaining the amount and connectivity of open space under city integration processes and reserving high-quality cropland, such as fish-pod-based agriculture, to mitigate habitat quality degradation. This study can provide insights for developing long-term land use management when applying compact city strategies to balance ecological conservation and urban development needs. • Three compact-city scenarios were developed to demonstrate urban morphology evolutions. • The same land use demand is adopted to examine the ecological consequences of the urban patterns. • Overall and regional habitat quality varies to different urban growth patterns. • Highly compact cities do not necessarily preserve habitats due to cropland displacement. • Less compact scenarios form new urban clusters under intensified leapfrogging development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]