Comparative Study of Suspended Sediment Load Prediction Models Based on Artificial Intelligence Methods

Abstract

Quantification of suspended load sediment is crucial for maintaining the ecosystem and quality of water/river bodies that serve as the habitat for many living organisms. Because the influencing factors are nonlinearly related to the suspended load sediment, it is a challenge to apply linear statistical models to predict accurately. To address such a problem, this study appliedartificial intelligence methods to simulate and predict suspended load sediment. The artificial intelligence methods are robust andcan handle adequately issues related to nonlinearity in modeling. In the present study, four artificial intelligence methods were developed to predict suspended sediment load distribution. The methods include a backpropagation neural network, group method of data handling, least squares support vector machine, and generalised regression neural network. In developing the respective models, drainage areas, river slopes, and length of rivers served as predictor variables while suspended sediment load was the response variable. The models were evaluated using the metrics of root mean square error, percentage root mean square error, uncertainty at 95%, root mean square error observations standard deviation ratio, and Legates and McCabe index. According to the results, the generalised regression neural network model achieved higher prediction accuracy than the other competing methods. The performance of the generalised regression neural network model can be attributed to its ability to calibrate and generalise appropriately to the training and testing data set. Hence, in practice, the generalised regression neural network model is proposed for suspended sediment load prediction for the study area which can be useful to policymakers and managers of water resources.