Comparison of cokriging and adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system models for suspended sediment load forecasting

The present research was carried out by using artificial neural network (ANN), adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS), cokriging (CK) and ordinary kriging (OK) using the rainfall and streamflow data for suspended sediment load forecasting. For this reason, the time series of daily rainfall (mm), streamflow (m(3)/s), and suspended sediment load (tons/day) data were used from the Kojor forest watershed near the Caspian Sea between 28 October 2007 and 21 September 2010 (776 days). Root mean square error, efficiency coefficient, mean absolute error, and mean relative error statistics are used for evaluating the accuracy of the ANN, ANFIS, CK, and OK models. In the first part of the study, various combinations of current daily rainfall, streamflow and past daily rainfall, streamflow data are used as inputs to the neural network and neuro-fuzzy computing technique so as to estimate current suspended sediment. Also, the accuracy of the ANN and ANFIS models are compared together in suspended sediment load forecasting. Comparison results reveal that the ANFIS model provided better estimation than the ANN model. In the second part of the study, the ANN and ANFIS models are compared with OK and CK. The comparison results reveal that CK was a better estimation than the OK. The ANFIS and ANN models also provided better estimation than the OK and CK models.