Assessment of Dimensionless Form of Kostiakov Model

Infiltration is the process by which water enters the earth’s surface. Although contribution of soil water to total water present on earth surface is negligible, but it is of prime importance for plant life. Very recently, dimensionless form of Kostiakov equation was proposed for precise estimation of Kostiakov model parameters. The present paper is an assessment of accuracy of proposed dimensionless form of Kostiakov model. However, it has been found that the cumulative infiltration estimated by nonlinear optimization technique are more accurate than those estimated by dimensionless form of Kostiakov equation and the graphical method. Therefore, the present paper proposes application of Generalized Reduced Gradient (GRG), a nonlinear optimization technique to estimate Kostiakov model parameters precisely rather than using dimensionless form of Kostiakov equation. Infiltration data of various types of soil have been considered in the present study for the generalization of the results.