River Basin Erosion

The course presents hydrological and sedimentological processes acting on and shaping the river basin. The river basin is viewed in terms of the production of sediment on hillslopes, transfer pathways along hillslopes to channels, the topology of river networks and channel morphology, and interactions of fluvial processes in the riparian zone and floodplain, with some management implications. The scales addressed are hillslope to catchment scales. The course has two fundamental aims: (1) It aims to provide environmental engineers with a process understanding of river basin sediment budgets, understanding where does sediment come from and why. (2) It aims to provide quantitative skills in making simple and complex predictions of river basin change using a range of models (from landscape evolution models, through USLE, to state-of-the-art physically-based spatially distributed approaches) and observations.

Content

The course consists of four sections: (1) Introduction to fluvial forms and processes and geomorphic concepts of landscape change, including timescales involved, and climatic and human activities acting on the system. (2) The processes of sediment production, upland sheet-rill-gully erosion, basin sediment yield, mass events such as landsliding, and the modelling of the individual processes involved from landscape scale to hillslope scale erosion modelling. (3) Defining catchment sediment budgets, methods to measure the terms, and examples of sediment cascade models and spatially-distributed models for sediment flux prediction. (4) Processes in the river, floodplain and riparian zone, including river network topology, channel geometry, basics of habitat analysis and floodplain vegetation dynamics.

River Basin Erosion is a course in the Master of Science in Environmental Engineering programme at ETH Zürich. Also Environmental and Earth Sciences students may find sections on the analytical/modelling parts in the course useful. The level is not intended for PhD students unless they are beginners in the field. The course materials consist of a series of lectures and exercises. The lectures were developed from textbooks, professional papers, and ongoing research activities of the instructor. This course is continuously developing.