Paper Info
Title
Extension of a GIS procedure for calculating the RUSLE equation LS factor
Abstract
The Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) and revised USLE (RUSLE) are often used to estimate soil erosion at regional landscape scales, however a major limitation is the difficulty in extracting the LS factor. The geographic information system-based (GIS-based) methods which have been developed for estimating the LS factor for USLE and RUSLE also have limitations. The unit contributing area-based estimation method (UCA) converts slope length to unit contributing area for considering two-dimensional topography, however is not able to predict the different zones of soil erosion and deposition. The flowpath and cumulative cell length-based method (FCL) overcomes this disadvantage but does not consider channel networks and flow convergence in two-dimensional topography. The purpose of this research was to overcome these limitations and extend the FCL method through inclusion of channel networks and convergence flow. We developed LS-TOOL in Microsoft's.NET environment using C@? with a user-friendly interface. Comparing the LS factor calculated with the three methodologies (UCA, FCL and LS-TOOL), LS-TOOL delivers encouraging results. In particular, LS-TOOL uses breaks in slope identified from the DEM to locate soil erosion and deposition zones, channel networks and convergence flow areas. Comparing slope length and LS factor values generated using LS-TOOL with manual methods, LS-TOOL corresponds more closely with the reality of the Xiannangou catchment than results using UCA or FCL. The LS-TOOL algorithm can automatically calculate slope length, slope steepness, L factor, S factor, and LS factors, providing the results as ASCII files which can be easily used in some GIS software. This study is an important step forward in conducting more accurate large area erosion evaluation.
Year
DOI
Venue
2013
10.1016/j.cageo.2012.09.027
Computers & Geosciences
Keywords
Field
DocType
fcl method,ls factor,ls-tool algorithm,l factor,accurate large area erosion,slope length,rusle equation ls factor,soil erosion,gis procedure,slope steepness,two-dimensional topography,channel network,gis
Geotechnical engineering,Convergence (routing),Geographic information system,Soil science,Computer science,Flow (psychology),Communication channel,Digital elevation model,Erosion,Universal Soil Loss Equation,Statistics
Journal
Volume
ISSN
Citations 
52,
0098-3004
6
PageRank 
References 
Authors
0.78
11
8
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Hongming Zhang1102.54
Qinke Yang2176.46
Rui Li391.54
Qingrui Liu4111.63
Demie Moore560.78
Peng He661.12
Coen J. Ritsema7103.02
Violette Geissen861.12