CSDMS 2015 annual meeting poster ShawnCarter
Quantifying the Effects of Land Use Dynamics on Global Scale Fluvial Suspended Sediment Flux
Sagy Cohen, University of Alabama, Alabama, United States.
Albert Kettner, University of Colorado, Colorado, United States.
Abstract:
Quantifying fluvial suspended sediment flux discharged to the coastal oceans is a vital task in geomorphology. At the global scale, this task is hampered by a lack of sediment gauges and measured observations. Empirical models have attempted to overcome this deficiency by modeling fluvial suspended sediment as a function of geological, climatic, and limited anthropogenic factors. On of these models, the BQART model as implemented in the Water Balance Model (Sediment) (WBMsed) Framework, estimates global fluvial suspended sediment flux accurately, however, in its current form, the model lacks a spatially and temporally explicit parameter to describe the amount of sediment discharge created by human activities.
This poster will describe the process and results of modifying BQART and WBMsed to incorporate explicit global land use classifications and their impact on fluvial suspended sediment. This is the first step in incorporating a temporal and spatially explicit parameter describing human alteration of the landscape to understand past, current, and future impacts on a fundamental geomorphological process.
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