Water erosion modeling by the Erosion Potential Method and the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation: a comparative analysis

Abstract

<jats:p>Water erosion is the principal degradation process of tropical soils, and its effects can be measured by modeling techniques. Erosion models provide a diagnosis of the soil loss intensity and can support the planning of soil conservation practices. Models with low data requirements, such as the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) and, more recently, the Erosion Potential Method (EPM), are mainly applied in Brazil. Thus, the objective of this work was to estimate water erosion soil-loss rates using the EPM and RUSLE models on a tropical subbasin, followed by a comparison of their outcomes. The models’ application considered soil physical parameters, edaphoclimatic conditions of the area, land use, and subbasin management practices. The accuracy of the methods was verified using total transported sediment and water discharge data. We compared the models using Pearson's correlation analyses, considering a 5% of significance. We found a predominance of moderate-intensity erosion with average soil loss of 1.17 and 1.46 Mg ha-1 year-1, measured by EPM and RUSLE, respectively. The EPM model underestimated soil losses by 15.27%, and RUSLE overestimated by 19.08%, indicating a higher percentage of areas with high erosion rates (4.60%). The models presented results with a different order of magnitude, but with significant correlations, indicating that both methods pointed out similar zones of intense and light-erosion rates.</jats:p>

Using the EPM method for the estimation of soil erosion in forest territories in the upper part of Dzherman River

“…From these results, we could make a conclusion that the EPM method underestimates erosion rates. The underestimation of EPM is also found by other authors (Lense et al, 2020).…”

Assessment of Soil Loss Susceptibility in Santa Rita Watershed in Southern Brazil

“…According to Merritt et al (2003), RUSLE was developed for small hillslopes; however, several studies have used it to estimate soil erosion at the watershed scale (Gianinetto et al, 2019;Gomes et al, Engenharia Agrícola, Jaboticabal, v.41, n.4, p.485-495, jul./aug. 2021Panditharathne et al, 2019;Lense et al, 2020). With the advent of Geographic Information Systems (GIS), it is possible to estimate soil loss pixel-by-pixel.…”

Study of hanging valley in loess-paleosoil sediments with soil erosion assessment using nuclear and erosion potential methods

“…Ero sion is the dom i nant pro cess at all ex per imen tal sites. The EPM es ti mates soil losses in an area but does not give the ac tual value of ero sion in ten sity or de ter mines the type of ero sive pro cess, un like the nu clear method in which a neg a tive sign clearly iden tifies ero sion and a pos i tive value for the ac cu mu la tion [35]. To de ter mine the ex tent to which the re sults of the four mod els ap plied are in ter re lated, they were subjected to cor re la tion anal y sis in SSPS pro gram.…”

“…Like sim i lar em pir i cal mod els (USLE, RUSLE), the EPM can be char ac ter ized as a di ag nos tic tool that should be crit i cally in ter preted and com bined with other tech niques and meth ods when ever pos si ble [35]. Em pir i cal mod els sim plify the phe nom ena through regres sive re la tion ships of ex per i men tal data that connect the sta tis ti cally most rel e vant pa ram e ters.…”