Effective factors on suspended sediment load in southwestern basins of Iran

Study of effective factors on sediment load of river basins has attracted more attentionin watershed management. In spite of the short record length, sediment load measuredin stations can be used in such studies. In this study, 20 sub-basins with measuredsediment data was identified and some 48 physiographic, climatic, geologic, andvegetation index factors were extracted for the sub-basins using GIS. Surface curvatureand satellite image-based vegetation indices were considered for the first time. Based onfactor analysis, four factors namely total area, percent of convex area, percent area withnorthwest aspect and percent area with NDVI>0.4 were the main factors. Clusteranalysis was applied to delineate homogeneous regions, which led to two regions. Theresults indicated that the factors mentioned above are the most influential factors onsediment load.