Investigation of effect of optimal time interval on the linear Muskingum method using particle swarm optimization algorithm

In engineering works, calculation of the peak zone of the flood is very important. Therefore, in the present study, a method was presented to increase the accuracy of the flood routing of the peak zone of the inflow hydrograph. The recorded data in the Ahwaz and Farsiat hydrometric stations were used, both of which are related to the Karun river, Iran. In contrast to previous studies, in addition to calculating the coefficients of linear Muskingum method (X, K), the time interval (Δt) parameter was also optimized in the present study using the PSO algorithm. The results showed that if only the X and K coefficients were calculated, the mean relative error (MRE) of the peak zone for the first, second and third floods were equal to 8.34, 2.24, and 1.99 %, respectively. However, by using the optimized Δt value, the corresponding error decreased to 5.14, 0.44, and 1.08 %.