Background This study aims to respond to the strategic demand for ecological protection and high-quality development in the Yellow River basin. To this end, research on the characteristics and driving forces of the spatiotemporal evolution of surface water bodies under the disturbance of intensive coal mining serves as the basis and a prerequisite for mitigating the contradiction between coal mining and water resources in ecologically fragile mining areas of the Yellow River basin.

Methods Based on 10 stages of remote sensing image data from 1980 to 2023, information about surface water bodies in the Yushenfu mining area was extracted using the ArcGIS platform. Accordingly, the spatiotemporal evolution characteristics of these surface water bodies were revealed. By combining the slope change ratio of cumulative quantity (SCRCQ) and the grey relational analysis (GRA) methods, the contributions of climatic factors and human activities to changes in the area of surface water bodies were quantitatively analyzed.

Results and Conclusions The area of surface water bodies in the Yushenfu mining area underwent a significant W-shaped composite evolution trajectory from 1980 to 2023, with a net increase of approximately 9 km². Specifically, the changes in the area of surface water bodies can be divided into four stages: shrinkage (1980-1990, −3.91 km²), recovery (1990-1995, 5.44 km²), continuous shrinkage (1995-2018, −15.77 km²), and rapid growth (2018-2023, 23.25 km²). Quantitative analysis using the SCRCQ model indicates that human activities contributed 81.3% of changes in the area of surface water bodies, while climatic factors contributed 18.7%. Among the climatic factors, average annual temperature, with a contribution of +17.43%, represented the dominant climatic factor. In contrast, annual rainfall exhibited negative effects on changes in the area of surface water bodies (contribution: −3.84%). Analysis using the GRA model suggests that the impacts of human activity factors on changes in the area of surface water bodies decreased in the order of changes in the arable land area (rational degree: 0.88), variations in population (rational degree: 0.82), and changes in coal production (rational degree: 0.51). Human activities were further identified as a dominant factor in the evolution of surface water bodies in the Yushenfu mining area. The results of this study can provide a scientific basis for ecological protection and sustainable water resources utilization in ecologically fragile mining areas in the Yellow River basin.