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Why the universal soil loss equation and the revised version of it do not
predict event erosion well

Article  in  Hydrological Processes · February 2005

DOI: 10.1002/hyp.5816

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HYDROLOGICAL PROCESSES
Hydrol. Process. 19, 851–854 (2005)
Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/hyp.5816
Why the universal soil loss equation and the revised
version of it do not predict event erosion well
P. I. A. Kinnell*
School of Resource, Environmental
and Heritage Sciences, University
of Canberra, Canberra ACT
2601 Australia
*Correspondence to:
P. I. A. Kinnell, School of
Resource, Environmental and
Heritage Sciences, University of
Canberra, Canberra ACT 2601,
Australia.
E-mail:
peter.kinnell@canberra.edu.au
Copyright  2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
INVITED COMMENTARY
Introduction
The universal soil loss equation (USLE; Wischmeier and Smith,
1978) and its revised version (RUSLE; Renard et al., 1997) were
developed to predict the long-term average annual erosion A from
field-sized areas from six factors: R the rainfall-runoff (erosivity)
factor, K the soil (erodibility) factor, L the slope length factor, S
the slope gradient factor, C the crop and management factor and P
the conservation support practice factor. The USLE/RUSLE model
is often represented by the equation
A = RKLSCP (1)
where R is the average annual sum of the event rainfall-runoff
(erosivity) factor when this factor is given by the product of the
kinetic energy of the rainstorm E and the maximum 30 min rainfall
intensity I30 , L = S = C = P = 1·0 when the area is bare fallow on
a 9% slope that is 22·13 m long with cultivation up and down the
slope, and K is the average annual soil loss per unit of R when
L = S = C = P = 1·0.
Although the USLE/RUSLE model was not designed to predict
event erosion, it can be suggested that erosion for a rainfall event
Ae is given by
Ae = EI30 Ke LSCe Pe (2)
where the subscript ‘e’ indicates parameter values that vary between
rainfall events. For a bare fallow plot with cultivation up and
down the slope, Ce = Pe = 1·0. Also, Ke is, in the case of the USLE,
considered not to vary with time, so that K e = K . As a result, the
relationship between Ae and EI30 can be expected to be to be given
by
Ae = bEI30 (3)
a linear equation that passes though the origin with b being a
coefficient. This expectation is not achieved in, for example, the case
of a bare fallow plot at Morris, MN (Figure 1), which is part of the
USLE/RUSLE database.
The Runoff Problem
One problem with the USLE/RUSLE model is that there is no direct
consideration of runoff even though erosion depends on sediment
Received 01 November 2004
851 Accepted 18 November 2004
 P. I. A. KINNELL

100
Re = EI30

predicted soil loss (t/ha)

10

0.1

Zln = 0.084
0.01
0.01 0.1 1 10 100
observed soil loss (t/ha)
Figure 1. Relationship between observed and predicted event soil loss for plot 10 (bare fallow) in experiment 1 at Morris, MN, when
predicted loss is bRe , where Re is EI30 . The line shows where observed and predicted values are equal. Zln is the Nash and Sutcliffe
(1970) efficiency factor for logarithmic transforms of the data. A value of zero indicates that the model is no better at predicting
the observed data than using the mean

being discharged with flow qs , which varies with 100

runoff qw and sediment concentration c s : Re = qw EI30/Be
predicted soil loss (t/ha)

10
qs = qw cs (4)

Given a capacity to determine runoff, and the 1

fact that sediment concentration is, at the plot
scale, dependent on the rate of expenditure of rain- 0.1
fall kinetic energy, it follows that cs varies with the
kinetic energy level of a rainstorm (kinetic energy Zln = 0.878
per unit quantity of rain) and some measure of 0.01
0.01 0.1 1 10 100
rainfall intensity. Assuming that I30 is an appro-
observed soil loss (t/ha)
priate measure of the intensity (Kinnell and Risse,
1998), the sediment concentration for an event c se Figure 2. Relationship between observed and predicted event soil
loss for plot 10 (bare fallow) in experiment 1 at Morris, MN,
is given by when predicted loss is kRe where Re = qw EI30 /Be
kEI30
cse = (5)
Be
The USLE/RUSLE Model Structure Problem
where Be is rainfall amount for the event and k is Although the USLE/RUSLE model is described
a coefficient, so that by Equation (1), it operates in a two-stage way.
Because the L, S , C and P factors are ratios with
kqw EI30 respect to the bare fallow cultivation up and down
qs = (6) the slope condition on a 9% 22·13 m slope, the
Be
USLE/RUSLE model operates as
As shown in Figure 2, this approach results in an A1 = RK (6a)
increased capacity to predict event loss on the bare
fallow at Morris, MN. A = A1 LSCP (6b)
Failure of the USLE/RUSLE model to include Thus, Equation (2) operates as
direct consideration of runoff leads to systematic
errors in the prediction of event erosion. A1e = Ke EI30 (7a)

Copyright  2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 852 Hydrol. Process. 19, 851–854 (2005)

Ae = A1e LSCe Pe
Although Equation (7a) can be replaced by an
equation that predicts A1e better, that in itself
does not mean that event erosion will then be pre-
dicted on a cropped area more reliably by the
combination of that equation and Equation (7b).
The problem with Equation (7b) is that it oper-
ates on the assumption that erosion occurs on
the vegetated area whenever erosion occurs on
the bare fallow area, and that is not true. This
is well illustrated by Figure 3, where A1e values
were measured on an adjacent bare fallow plot
and used with Equation (7b) to predict event losses
on a cropped plot. The approach results in signifi-
cant amounts of erosion being predicted for many
events that did not produce erosion on the vege-
tated plot.
The Impact on Predicting Long-Term
Erosion
It has been observed that the USLE/RUSLE over-
predicts low annual average erosion and under-
predicts high average erosion (Risse et al., 1993;
Rapp et al., 2001). It follows from Figures 1, 2
and 3 that the failure to consider runoff explic-
itly in the model is a factor in producing such
errors. Erosion is a hydrologically driven process
and runoff is a factor that is considered explicitly
in more process-based models like WEPP (Nearing
100
predicted event soil loss (t/acre)
10
1
0.1
0.01
0.0001 0.001 0.01 0.1
observed event soil loss + 0.0001 (t/acre)
Figure 3. Relationship between event soil losses predicted by
multiplying event soil losses from a nearby bare fallow plot by
RUSLE-period soil loss ratios (fortnightly C factor values) and
event soil losses observed for conventional corn at Clarinda, IA,
plus 0·0001 tons acre−1 to enable predicted losses to be displayed
when observed losses are zero
Copyright  2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
INVITED COMMENTARY
(7b) et al., 1989) and EUROSEM (Morgan et al., 1998).
However, if, for example, direct consideration of
runoff is used to enhance the prediction of event
soil loss and, in recognition of the problem associ-
ated with Equation (7b), runoff from the vegetated
area in determining event erosivity for the veg-
etated area is used rather than for bare fallow,
then values for the crop and management effect
and the conservation practice factor differ from
the Ce and Pe values (Kinnell, 2003). However, if
erosion is considered on an average annual basis,
then Equation (6b) applies if R is not EI30 and K is
determined with respect to that fact. For example,
consider the case of the event erosivity index used
in the USLE-M (Kinnell and Risse, 1998—which
is numerically the same as the product of runoff,
kinetic energy level and I30 considered in Figure 2)
the annual average erosivity for the bare fallow
cultivation up and down the slope condition is
given by

n
QR1i EI30i
i =1
RUM1 = (8)
Y
where QR1i is the runoff ratio for the bare fallow
cultivation up and down the slope condition for
event i , n is the number of rainfall events that
occurred in Y years and the erodibility index is
given by
A1
KUM = (9)
RUM1
This results in
A1 = RUM1 KUM (10)
and so
A = RUM1 KUM LSCP (11)
This is because the product of erosivity and erodi-
bility factors is directed at predicting A 1 no matter
what parameters are involved in determining the
event erosivity index, and, on an average annual
basis, erosion on a vegetated area will occur when
1 10 100
C > 0. Consequently, the condition that A > 0 will
occur when A1 > 0 will be met. Also, the condi-
tion that erosion occurs on both bare and vegetated
areas will almost certainly be met on a yearly basis
in most locations, so that
AA = RUM1·A KUM LSCA PA (12)
853 Hydrol. Process. 19, 851–854 (2005)
 P. I. A. KINNELL
where AA is the soil loss for a given year, CA
and PA are the C and P factors, and R UM1·A the
sum of the product of QR1i and EI30i , for that
year, respectively. RUM1·A is given by Equation (8)
when Y = 1 and n is the number of events in a
given year. Equation (12) provides an approach
that reduces the tendency for overprediction of low
annual erosion and underprediction of high annual
erosion.
Although including the runoff as an indepen-
dent factor in modelling erosion can be shown to
improve the accuracy of the USLE/RUSLE, the
prediction of erosion then requires runoff to be
predicted with an acceptable degree of accuracy.
There are a number of procedures for predict-
ing runoff, and the USDA curve number method
(USDA, 1972) is used in water quality models like
AGNPS (Young et al., 1987) and SWAT (Arnold
et al., 1998). However, it has been argued (Nearing,
2000) that the level of accuracy by which runoff
can be predicted is not sufficient for models like the
USLE-M to replace the USLE/RUSLE. Although
the matter of runoff prediction may be a matter for
debate, the fact remains that the failure to consider
runoff as a primary factor in the USLE/RUSLE
model is a factor in causing the USLE/RUSLE
to produce systematic errors in the prediction of
event erosion, which in turn leads to systematic
errors in predicting average annual soil loss.
References
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Research 41: 991– 1003.
Copyright  2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
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