The Rain Drop Impact on the Water Discharge and Sediment Transport under the Full-Scale Test

Abstract

The magnitude of soil erosion by water remains
high in the tropical regions. The construction activities further
worsen this process which leads to the undesirable effects. The
newly constructed highway embankments usually remain bare
and are considered to be the prime agent of soil loss. The soil
surface with an appropriate cover helps restricting the soil
detachment for which many agronomic soil conservation
practices have been used. This paper integrates that why a simple
grass cover has been recommended to cope with this inevitable
issue. It further assimilates the results obtained from a full scale
test conducted in the Perak State Malaysia under the simulated
rainfall condition of 40 mm/hour (average rainfall event) for
which the rainfall data was obtained from the Meteorological
department Perak State, Malaysia from the year (2005-2011).
The volume rate of water flow and sediment transport was
observed at different time intervals for three plots i.e. (Plot-I) the
fully grass covered surface, (Plot-II) the bare soil surface, and
(Plot-III) 50% of the grass covered surface with an area of 2
meters by 6 meters having a slope angle of 30°. The results
obtained showed maximum water discharge and soil loss for
(Plot-II) the bare soil surface, which was found to be 5.78 x 10-5
m3 sec-1 and 500.9 g m-2 respectively.