New proposed method for prediction of reservoir sedimentation distribution

Prediction of sediment distribution in reservoirs is an important issue for dam designers to determine the reservoir active storage capacity. Methods proposed to calculate sediment distribution are varied, and mainly empirical. Among all the methods currently available, only area-reduction and area-increment methods are considered as the principal methods for prediction of sediment distribution. In this paper, data of 16 reservoirs in the United States are used to propose a new empirical method for prediction of sediment distribution in reservoirs. In the proposed method, reservoir sediment distribution is related to sediment volume and original reservoir characteristics. To validate the accuracy of the new proposed method, obtained results are compared with survey data for two reservoirs. The results of this investigation showed that the proposed method has an acceptable accuracy.