Effects of compartmental model structure and long-term inflow pollutograph on model predictions

¹ Swedish Radiation Protection Authority (SSI), 171 16 Stockholm, Sweden
² Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Box 7013, 750 07 Uppsala, Sweden

Abstract

Model predictions of solute transport in a wetland were compared with tracer experimental data to illustrate that the number of compartments in a compartmental model should be selected according to certain rules to accurately describe the transport process. If the input pulse is short, the model structure affects the output significantly. The temporal moments of the residence time distribution was obtained from a general solution of the compartmental model in the Laplace domain derived with an arbitrary inflow pollutograph. The variance of the residence time can be used as a useful tool to analyse the effect of model structure and long-term inflow pollutograph on the response of the model predictions.