Document Type : Research Paper
Authors
1 MSc, Faculty of Natural Resources, Tarbiat Modares University, Iran
2 Professor, Faculty of Natural Resources, Tarbiat Modares University, Iran
3 Associate Professor, Faculty of Natural Resources, Tarbiat Modares University, Iran
Abstract
Soil erosion as a threatening phenomenon for the world population is mostly the result of the combined effects of unsuitable land use and climatic factors. Among climatic factors, rainfall is considered as one of the main causes of soil erosion and therefore detailed study of the different properties of rainfall such as rainfall erosivity is necessary. However, investigation of spatial variability of rainfall erosivity factor at different scales at national level has been less considered. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the spatial variability of rainfall erosivity factor in Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) for monthly, seasonal and annual scales in Iran. Towards this attempt, the amounts of rainfall erosivity factor were calculated through calculation of kinetic energy and maximum 30-minute intensity over 12,000 showers occurred at 70 stations in the study period of 20 years (1984-2004) in Iran. The spatial patterns of temporal variation were also in different time scales. According to the results, existing stations in the south west and north of the country had the first priority of annual rainfall erosivity factor hazard. The west and south west stations and south east stations had also the highest and the lowest seasonal and monthly risk rainfall erosivity factor, respectively. Also, results showed Tangpich in Khuzistan, Anzali in Giulan and Poleshalo in Khuzistan had the maximum rainfall erosivity factor whereas Bande Enherafi in Semnan, Tabas in South Khorasan and Bam in Kerman Provinces had the minimum annual rainfall erosivity factor hazard country wide. The average annual rainfall erosivity factor in the country was ultimately obtained 14.13 tm.ha-1.cm.h-1.
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