Sediment delivery ratio of single flood events and the influencing factors in a headwater basin of the Chinese Loess Plateau

Little is known about the sediment delivery of single flood events although it has been well known that the sediment delivery ratio at the inter-annual time scale is close to 1 in the Chinese Loess Plateau. This study examined the sediment delivery of single flood events and the influencing factors...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2014-11, Vol.9 (11), p.e112594-e112594
Main Authors: Zheng, Mingguo, Liao, Yishan, He, Jijun
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Basins (Geology)
Channel scour
China
Creeks & streams
Earth Sciences
Ecological Parameter Monitoring - statistics & numerical data
Floods
Fresh Water
Geologic Sediments - analysis
Geomorphology
Humans
Hydrodynamics
Kinetic energy
Laboratories
Loam soils
Loess
Precipitation
Rain
Rainfall
Rainfall amount
Rainfall duration
Rainfall intensity
Reservoirs
Runoff
Sediment concentration
Sediment yield
Sediments
Soil
Soil conservation
Soil erosion
Soil sciences
Studies
Topography
Water shortages
Watershed management
Watersheds
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Little is known about the sediment delivery of single flood events although it has been well known that the sediment delivery ratio at the inter-annual time scale is close to 1 in the Chinese Loess Plateau. This study examined the sediment delivery of single flood events and the influencing factors in a headwater basin of the Loess Plateau, where hyperconcentrated flows are dominant. Data observed from plot to subwatershed over the period from 1959 to 1969 were presented. Sediment delivery ratio of a single event (SDRe) was calculated as the ratio of sediment output from the subwatershed to sediment input into the channel. It was found that SDRe varies greatly for small events (runoff depth 30 mm). We examined 11 factors of rainfall (rainfall amount, rainfall intensity, rainfall kinetic energy, rainfall erosivity and rainfall duration), flood (area-specific sediment yield, runoff depth, peak flow discharge, peak sediment concentration and flood duration) and antecedent land surface (antecedent precipitation) in relation to SDRe. Only the peak sediment concentration significantly correlates with SDRe. Contrary to popular belief, channel scour tends to occur in cases of higher peak sediment concentrations. Because small events also have chances to attain a high sediment concentration, many small events (rainfall depth
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0112594