Saturday, January 24, 2009
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Effective Discharge and Sediment Supply
Effective discharge is the discharge that transports the most sediment over the range of stream flows. I have been thinking about what distinguishes effective discharge from stream power, based upon some papers at the AGU. If sediment supply to the system is unlimited (transport-limited) then the peak on the plot of stream power vs. duration of flow should approximate the effective discharge; if the sediment supply is limited (ie. supply-limited conditions) then this is only a nominal effective discharge because the actual sediment transport will depend on the sediment supply. I think. More about this later - at the moment I don't really know enough about stream power, so I'll be hitting the books.
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