Title: Evaluation of quasi-maximum likelihood and smearing estimator to improve sediment rating curve estimation

Authors: Meysam Salarijazi; Mohammad Abdolhosseini; Khalil Ghorbani; Saeid Eslamian

Addresses: Water Engineering Department, College of Water and Soil Engineering, Gorgan University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Gorgan 49189-43464, Iran ' Water Engineering Department, College of Water and Soil Engineering, Gorgan University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Gorgan 49189-43464, Iran ' Water Engineering Department, College of Water and Soil Engineering, Gorgan University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Gorgan 49189-43464, Iran ' Water Engineering Department, Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan 84156-83111, Iran

Abstract: The basic sediment rating curve (SRC) method suffers from the lack of accuracy in most cases. Two estimation methods including quasi-maximum likelihood estimator (QMLE) and non-parametric or smearing estimator are investigated in this study to consider changes in basic SRC estimations. Four hydrometric stations datasets in Gorgan Gulf basin in northern part of Iran are selected as case study and graphical assessment, RMSE and Nash-Sutcliff statistics are applied for evaluation of different methods. Graphical assessment shows that the correction methods tend to decrease the distance between observed and predicted sediment load by basic method in three of four cases. In addition, goodness of fit statistics implies better results for the application of quasi-maximum likelihood estimator method compared to basic SRC and smearing methods.

Keywords: sediment load; basic sediment rating curve; quasi-maximum likelihood estimator; QMLE; non-parametric estimation; smearing estimation; Gorgan Gulf Basin; Iran.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHST.2016.079352

International Journal of Hydrology Science and Technology, 2016 Vol.6 No.4, pp.359 - 370

Received: 12 Oct 2015
Accepted: 29 Dec 2015

Published online: 27 Sep 2016 *

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