EVALUATION OF SOME APPROACHES TO ESTIMATING NON‐POINT POLLUTANT LOADS FOR UNMONITORED AREAS1

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Evaluation of the non‐point source pollutant load entering a lake from multiple tributaries requires either that all tributaries be monitored or that some extrapolation method be used to estimate loads originating in areas not monitored. Unmonitored areas include not only watersheds of tributaries that are not monitored, but also portions of a monitored tributary's drainage basin downstream from the monitoring site and areas of direct drainage. Significant portions of large lake drainage basins are often not monitored, and loads for these areas are often estimated by extrapolation. Six simple extrapolation procedures were evaluated by using them to estimate loads for areas that had been monitored and comparing the estimated loads with the monitored loads. Three approaches were based on inter‐basin ratios of area, C‐factor, and discharge. The other approaches used regression relationships between concentration and flow to estimate concentrations for the unmonitored basin. The ratio approaches generally were more reliable than the regression approaches. However, extrapolation by any method tested was not very precise. Some methods also were biased when applied to watersheds of a size different than the monitored one. Extrapolation by any of these methods would compromise the precision of the lake‐wide load estimate, if the unmonitored area were a significant part of the entire basin.