Abstract
Numerical models are important tools for analyzing and solving water resources problems; however, a model’s reliability heavily depends on its calibration. This paper presents a method based on Design of Experiments theory for calibrating numerical models of rivers by considering the interaction between different calibration parameters, identifying the most sensitive parameters and finding a value or a range of values for which the calibration parameters produces an adequate performance of the model in terms of accuracy. The method consists of a systematic process for assessing the qualitative and quantitative performance of a hydromorphological numeric model. A 75 km reach of the Meta River, in Colombia, was used as case study for validating the method. The modeling was conducted by using the software package MIKE-21C, a two-dimensional flow model. The calibration is assessed by means of an Overall Weighted Indicator, based on the coefficient of determination of the calibration parameters and within a range from 0 to 1. For the case study, the most significant calibration parameters were the sediment transport equation, the riverbed load factor and the suspended load factor. The optimal calibration produced an Overall Weighted Indicator equal to 0.857. The method can be applied to any type of morphological models.
Highlights
Numerical models have become an essential tool for researching and developing engineering solutions related to water resources problems [1]
The main contribution of this paper is to present a calibration method based on Design of Experiments (DOE) theory that allows: calibration of the model considering the interplay between the calibration parameters; identification of the most sensitive parameters within the calibration process; and determination of a value or a range of values for which the calibration parameters produce an adequate performance of the model in terms of accuracy
As described in the previous section, their accuracy was assessed through the measured water levels and percentages of flow distribution through river branches as indicators
Summary
Numerical models have become an essential tool for researching and developing engineering solutions related to water resources problems [1]. Models enable complex underlying processes to be captured, and facilitate the analysis of interrelationships between variables in cases with limited data [2]. Modeling has major applications in fields such as hydrology, maritime and coastal studies [3,4], river hydraulics [5] and water quality [6]. Calibration is one of the most important activities within the modeling process, because the model’s credibility strongly depends on it [7]. The importance and impact of calibration on hydrological and hydraulics models has been assessed and confirmed by several authors [10,11,12,13]
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