Suspended sediment yield modeling in Mahanadi River, India by multi-objective optimization hybridizing artificial intelligence algorithms

River sediment produced through weathering is one of the principal landscape modification processes on earth. Rivers are an integral part of the hydrologic cycle and are the major geologic agents that erode the continents and transport water and sediments to the oceans. Estimation of suspended sediment yield is always a key parameter for planning and management of any river system. It is always challenging to model sediment yield using traditional mathematical models because they are incapable of handling the complex non-linearity and non-stationarity. The suspended sediment modeling of the river depends on the number of factors such as rock type, relief, rainfall, temperature, water discharge and catchment area. In this study, we proposed a hybrid genetic algorithm-based multi-objective optimization with artificial neural network (GA-MOO-ANN) with automated parameter tuning model using these factors to estimate the suspended sediment yield in the entire Mahanadi River basin. The model was validated by comparing statistically with other models, and it appeared that the GA-MOO-ANN model has the lowest root mean squared error (0.009) and highest coefficient of correlation (0.885) values among all comparative models (traditional neural network, multiple linear regression, and sediment rating curve) for all stations. It was also observed that the proposed model is the least biased (0.001) model. Thus, the proposed GA-MOOANN is the most capable model, compared to other studied models, for estimating the suspended sediment yield in the entire Mahanadi river basin. India. The results also suggested that the proposed GA-MOO-ANN model is unable to estimate suspended sediment yield satisfactorily at gauge stations having very small catchment areas whereas performing satisfactorily on locations having moderate to the large catchment area. The models provide the best result at Tikarapara, the gauge station location in the extreme downstream, having the largest catchment area. (C) 2020 International Research and Training Centre on Erosion and Sedimentation/the World Association for Sedimentation and Erosion Research. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This study proposed a hybrid genetic algorithm-based multi-objective optimization with artificial neural network model to estimate the suspended sediment yield in the entire Mahanadi River basin. The model outperformed traditional neural network, multiple linear regression, and sediment rating curve models in terms of statistical comparison. It showed poorer performance at gauge stations with very small catchment areas but performed well at locations with moderate to large catchment areas.