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Performance Evaluation of a Fuzzy Hybrid Clustering Technique to Identify Flood Source Areas

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Abstract

Prioritization of flood source areas (FSAs) is of paramount importance in flood management to adopt proportional measures within a watershed. Unit Flood Response (UFR) approach has been proposed to identify FSAs at subwatershed and/or cell scale. In this study, a distributed modified Clark (ModClark) model coupled with Muskingum flow routing method was used for hydrological simulations. Furthermore, SOMFCM clustering techniques involving Self-Organizing Feature Maps (SOFM) and Fuzzy C-Means algorithm (FCM) were used to identify Hydrologic Homogenous Regions (HHRs). The case studies were two semi-arid watersheds including Tangrah in northeastern Iran and eastern part of Walnut Gulch Experimental Watershed (WGEW) in Arizona. DEM-derived geomorphological and hydrological features were entered into Factor Analysis (FA) to determine the most effective variables in runoff generation. The optimum SOMFCM resulted in clustered HHRs map which was generally similar to that of the UFR-delineated FSAs at cell scale, especially in cases of maximum flood index values for both watersheds. Although clustering techniques, such as SOMFCM, cannot directly provide a map of FSAs involving absolute values of flood index, most dominant watershed physical features may be used to identify the most critical, or effective FSAs through clustered HHRs. Application of SOMFCM in two semi-arid watersheds demonstrated that SOMFCM provides a simple and useful tool to qualitatively identify the ranking of FSAs across a watershed. Therefore, the clustered HHRs involving higher ranks of FSAs that represent the most flood active regions, are expected to assist policymakers for effective management of floods.

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Acknowledgements

The authors appreciate the data provided by the USDA-ARS Southwest Watershed Research Center in Tucson Arizona, USA. The authors would also like to offer their special thanks to Dr. Mohammad Elmi for his help in software development.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Water Resources Management, Faculty of Civil, Water and Environmental Engineering, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran

    Naser Dehghanian & S. Saeid Mousavi Nadoushani

  2. Department of Technical and Engineering, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran

    Bahram Saghafian

  3. Soil Conservation and Watershed Management Research Institute (SCWMRI), Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran

    Ruhangiz Akhtari

Authors
  1. Naser Dehghanian
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  2. S. Saeid Mousavi Nadoushani
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  3. Bahram Saghafian
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  4. Ruhangiz Akhtari
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Correspondence to S. Saeid Mousavi Nadoushani.

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Dehghanian, N., Nadoushani, S.S.M., Saghafian, B. et al. Performance Evaluation of a Fuzzy Hybrid Clustering Technique to Identify Flood Source Areas. Water Resour Manage 33, 4621–4636 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-019-02385-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-019-02385-7

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