Targeted Application of Seasonal Load Duration Curves Using Multivariate Analysis in Two Watersheds Flowing Into Lake Houston1

Abstract

Teague, Aarin, Philip B. Bedient, and Birnur Guven, 2011. Targeted Application of Seasonal Load Duration Curves Using Multivariate Analysis in Two Watersheds Flowing Into Lake Houston. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 47(3):620‐634. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752‐1688.2011.00529.x Abstract: Water quality is a problem in Lake Houston, the primary source of drinking water for the City of Houston, Texas, due to pollutant loads coming from the influent watersheds, including Spring Creek and Cypress Creek. Statistical analysis of the historic water quality data was developed to understand the source characterization and seasonality of the watershed. Multivariate analysis including principal component, cluster, and discriminant analysis provided a custom seasonal assessment of the watersheds so that loading curves may be targeted for season specific pollutant source characterization. The load duration curves have been analyzed using data collected by the U.S. Geologic Survey with corresponding City of Houston water quality data at the sites to characterize the behavior of the pollutant sources and watersheds. Custom seasons were determined for Spring Creek and Cypress Creek watersheds and pollutant source characterization compared between the seasons and watersheds.

Estimation of Nutrient Load for Effective Water Resource Management in Dams: A case study of the Roodeplaat Dam, Southern Africa

“…The tool that was used to determine the relationship between water quality and water ows is the LDC. LDCs are plots of actual pollutant loading to a waterbody superimposed on the allowable loading to the waterbody (Teague et al 2011). The rst step in generating the LDC is evaluating the FDC.…”

“…When the actual load exceeds the allowable loading under dry or low ow conditions, a contravention of the water quality standard occurs (Teague et al 2011). In this context, water quality standard exceedance near high ows ( ow exceedance range <40%) was associated with rainfall events and pollution sources were classi ed as non-point sources; conversely, water quality standard exceedance near low ows ( ow exceedance range > 60%) was associated with dry weather conditions, and pollution sources were classi ed as point sources.…”

Pollutant transport model with large time‐scale and estimation of land‐use export coefficients at a watershed level

“…Several studies have used large amounts of monitoring data to conduct statistical analyses of land export coefficients (Clune et al, 2020; Costa et al, 2022; Ezzati et al, 2023; Oelsner & Stets, 2019; Park et al, 2019; Teague et al, 2011; Yadav & Pandey, 2017; Yi et al, 2020). Instead of systematically analyzing pollutant exports from different sources and the process of pollutant transportation through runoff, statistical analysis can be used to directly obtain land export coefficients (using monitoring data).…”

A New Approach to Use Load Duration Curves to Evaluate Water Quality: A Study in the Doce River Basin, Brazil

“…Thus, the analysis of loads can improve watershed planning through the provision of a better description of water quality concerns [13]. For instance, the LDCs can easily portray the streamflow classes in disagreement with the regulations, and therefore, shed light on best management practices to improve water quality [14,15]. In that context, pollution events related to shorter permanence (i.e., high flows) are usually associated with diffuse pollution sources, whereas events related to higher permanence (i.e., low flows) are commonly linked to point source pollution [11,13,16].In Brazil, there have been some attempts to use LDCs, but the frequent non-synchronous streamflow and water quality sampling represented a limitation [17][18][19][20].…”