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Co-Kriging Estimation of Nitrate-Nitrogen Loads in an Agricultural River

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Abstract

Daily nitrate-nitrogen (NO3-N) loads in the Raccoon River, Iowa, were estimated using Ordinary kriging (OK), Cokriging (CK), and a standard rating curve method (LOADEST) based on a dataset of 3451 measurements of NO3-N concentration collected over 19 years. The CK estimation utilizes the temporal correlation of NO3-N load with daily discharge and honors the measured points to improve estimation relative to regression based models. Loads were estimated using the observed concentrations and three subsets of the measured data that correspond to three frequencies (weekly, biweekly, and monthly). Results indicated that daily NO3-N loads were best estimated by CK using measured loads with daily discharge. Daily load estimates produced by OK using weekly data matched well with measured values, but discrepancies emerged when samples were collected less frequently, e.g., biweekly and monthly. For the entire 19-year dataset, compared to measured loads, the estimated total NO3-N load decreased using OK when samples were collected monthly, but increased using CK. Load estimation using the seven-parameter LOADEST model did not perform well for the Raccoon River because the correlation of NO3-N concentration to river discharge was poor. For the site studied, weekly and biweekly sampling may be sufficient to estimate daily NO3-N loads with CK when daily discharge data is available.

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Acknowledgments

This work was made possible by resources contributed by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, the National Nature Science Foundation of China (NSFC-41272260, NSFC-41330314, NSFC-41302180, and NSFC-41203062), the national project “Water Pollution Control” of China (2012ZX07204-001, 2012ZX07204-003), the Jiangsu province scientific and technological project (BE2015708, SBK201341336), and the Iowa Soybean Association. The authors are grateful to the Editor, Associate Editor, and the two reviewers for their encouraging, insightful and constructive comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Hydrosciences Research, Nanjing University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, 210093, People’s Republic of China

    Xiuyu Liang & You-Kuan Zhang

  2. Iowa Geological Survey, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, 52242, USA

    Keith Schilling

  3. Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, 52242, USA

    You-Kuan Zhang

  4. Iowa Soybean Association, Ankeny, IA, 50023, USA

    Christopher Jones

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  1. Xiuyu Liang
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  2. Keith Schilling
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  3. You-Kuan Zhang
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  4. Christopher Jones
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Correspondence to You-Kuan Zhang.

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Liang, X., Schilling, K., Zhang, YK. et al. Co-Kriging Estimation of Nitrate-Nitrogen Loads in an Agricultural River. Water Resour Manage 30, 1771–1784 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-016-1250-9

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