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The process of estimating sediment load has been a daunting issue in hydraulics and the water resource field. Several methods exist for predicting the sediment load in a catchment or river, but the majority of these methods are empirical and depend on the specific location where they are used. Understanding the underlying mechanism of sediment generation and its transport in connection with precipitation, topography, and subsurface conditions to characterize its process is helpful for determining the sediment load in a river. For this purpose, we analyzed the daily suspended sediment data measured for 8 years at the headworks of the Kabeli A hydropower project in the Kabeli River, which originates from the Himalayan region. The analyses show that the suspended sediment concentration (SSC) varies in an orderly manner over time and asynchronously between seasons with respect to the river discharge. Clockwise hysteresis is observed in the yearly plots between the SSC and river discharge. The hysteresis becomes narrower when compared with the direct runoff obtained from a digital filtering algorithm and, even more so with the direct runoff from the hydrological model SWAT. The analysis shows that the sediment concentration is controlled not only by the total discharge in the river but also by the contribution of ground water to the river discharge, indicating that the total discharge alone cannot reflect the seasonal variation in SSC. It is inferred that the river is supply-limited and the hillslope is transport-limited with respect to sediment sources. The SWAT model suggests that the base flow contribution to the total river discharge is 78%. Here, we present a method for constructing the suspended sediment rating curve by comparing the direct runoff with the sediment concentration. The deduced sediment rating curve captures 84.51% of the total sediment load over the study period in the Kabeli River. This method may potentially be used in similar catchments with supply-limited rivers and transport-limited hillslopes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unreinforced Masonry buildings (URMs) were the most prevalent construction practice in the rural areas of Nepal. During the 2015 Gorkha earthquake, most of these buildings suffered critical damage. Consequently, after the disaster, National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) was established to provide technical and financial assistance in the reconstruction process. This paper provides a qualitative framework for the assessment of masonry residential buildings in rural areas, considering the NRA minimum requirement, with Bhalche, Nuwakot as the study area. Rapid Visual Screening (RVS) and Key Informant Survey (KIS) were used to study, inspect and collect data and obtained results are compared with NRA minimum guidelines and Codal provisions. The study focuses only on a small but representative sample of reconstructed buildings rather than every building, with how and why of a particular issue rather than how many. The examination found that the reconstructed buildings in Bhalche have minor noncompliance issues, while significant noncompliance issues are found in all the houses constructed before the Government of Nepal's(GON) initiatives for reconstruction by the local people themselves using available local resources and existing knowledge. The KIS and RVS results are supported by case study examples and photos, respectively. The study also reviews the current building typology in Bhalche and attempts to delineate the rationale contributing to the undesired discrepancy in reconstructed buildings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]