Toward coupling of nonlinear support vector regression and crowd intelligence optimization algorithms in estimation of suspended sediment load

Abstract Sediment phenomenon is very important in hydraulic and water resources issues. The existence of this phenomenon causes many problems in water storage. Sediment simulation in rivers helps in controlling sediment as well as reducing damages. In this study, an attempt was made to estimate the suspended sediment load using the corresponding river flow rate in the Zohreh River, Iran using the newest intelligent simulation methods. This study seeks to couple the nonlinear support vector regression (SVR) with crowd intelligence optimization algorithms. For this purpose, support vector regression was optimized using four new crowd optimization algorithms including the ant colony optimizer (ACO), the ant lion optimizer (ALO), the dragonfly algorithm (DA), and the salp swarm algorithm (SSA). Simulation was done in the two phases of train and test. Due to the integration of the nonlinear support vector regression with the optimization algorithms, the model train phase requires more time than usual situations. Therefore, in the current study, taking into account the number of different iterations including 25, 50, 100 and 200 iterations to perform the optimization of the model and tried to find the best optimizer by considering the calculated error and the run time. It was generally found that the SVR model is accurate in estimating the suspended sediment load. Finally, according to the calculated error as well as the run time, the support vector regression model optimized with the salp swarm algorithm with 25 iterations was chosen as the best model. Also, the values of R2, NSE, and RMSE for the best model in the test phase were calculated as 1, 1, and 10.2 tons per day, respectively, and the algorithm run time was 252 s.