Spatial and temporal patterns of suspended sediment concentrations in the Rhine River

Abstract

Suspended sediment is a natural and crucial component and plays a crucial role in the hydrological, ecological and geomorphological functioning of the river system. The main objective of this study was to understand the spatial and temporal variation of SSC in Rhine River. This study used daily data of suspended sediment concentration from 1952 to 2016 from SSC model Sutari et al. (submitted manuscript, 2019) and daily data of water discharge collected from International Commission for the Protection of the Rhine (IKSR) and Dutch Rijkswaterstaat from 1995 to 2016 to understand the change of SSC. Analyses of product images suggest that the change of SSC shows a marked increase of about 6 mg/L at Upper Rhine (km 0 to km 435), a gradual increase of about 3 mg/L at Middle Rhine (km 435 to km 735), and is relatively constant at Lower Rhine (km 735 to km 865). Turning to seasonal variation, high SSC is mostly found in winter while low SSC is mostly found in summer. However, another result shows that the SSC tend to be high in June at almost all monitoring stations where the discharge is minimum. Meanwhile, under high discharge condition, the Mosel River gives the most significant contribution of SSC to the Rhine compared to other tributaries due to having a high discharge.