ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Evaluating SWAT Snowmelt Parameters
and Simulating Spring Snowmelt Nonpoint
Source Pollution in the Source Area
of the Liao River
Yu Wang1, Jianmin Bian1, Sining Wang1, Jie Tang1, Fei Ding2
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1Key Lab of Groundwater Resources and Environment, Jilin Province, College of the Environment and Resources,
Jilin University, Changchun 130021, China
2Key Laboratory of Beijing for Water Quality Science and Water Environment Recovery Engineering,
College of Architecture and Civil Engineering,
Beijing University of Technology, Beijing 100000, China
Submission date: 2016-03-22
Final revision date: 2016-05-11
Acceptance date: 2016-05-14
Publication date: 2016-10-05
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2016;25(5):2177-2185
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ABSTRACT
Snowmelt hydrology becomes an important component of the soil and water assessment tool (SWAT)
when spring flows are dominated by melting snow. The objective of this study was to evaluate the
performance of the SWAT model’s snowmelt parameters by simulating nonpoint source pollution in the
source area of the Liao River – a cold area in China. The seven snowmelt parameters for the simulation
were adjusted. The exports rule of nonpoint source pollution for the spring snowmelt period was analyzed.
The result show that SFTMP, SMTMP, SMFMX, SMFMN, and TIMP were sensitive parameters, while
SNOCOVMX and SNO50COV were insensitive. In addition, two common statistics (Nash-Sutcliffe
coefficient, and coefficient of determination) were used to evaluate the model. This evaluation indicated
that the SWAT model had good performance simulating the seasonal nonpoint source pollution with large
snowmelt. According to the analysis, rainfall and snowmelt is a main driver of nonpoint source pollution
in the cold area, and that summer and spring are high-risk seasons. The study provides a new and suitable
method of nonpoint source pollution simulation for the cold areas.