page_title: Sediment transport
section_title: Transport rate
hierarchical_section_title: Sediment transport / Transport rate
caption_attribution_description: Stream cross section showing stream load
context_page_description: Sediment transport is the movement of solid particles, typically due to a combination of gravity acting on the sediment, and/or the movement of the fluid in which the sediment is entrained. Sediment transport occurs in natural systems where the particles are clastic rocks, mud, or clay; the fluid is air, water, or ice; and the force of gravity acts to move the particles along the sloping surface on which they are resting. Sediment transport due to fluid motion occurs in rivers, oceans, lakes, seas, and other bodies of water due to currents and tides. Transport is also caused by glaciers as they flow, and on terrestrial surfaces under the influence of wind. Sediment transport due only to gravity can occur on sloping surfaces in general, including hillslopes, scarps, cliffs, and the continental shelf—continental slope boundary.
  Sediment transport is important in the fields of sedimentary geology, geomorphology, civil engineering and environmental engineering. Knowledge of sediment transport is most often used to determine whether erosion or deposition will occur, the magnitude of this erosion or deposition, and the time and distance over which it will occur.
context_section_description: Formulas to calculate sediment transport rate exist for sediment moving in several different parts of the flow. These formulas are often segregated into bed load, suspended load, and wash load. They may sometimes also be segregated into bed material load and wash load.
caption: A schematic diagram of where the different types of sediment load are carried in the flow. Dissolved load is not sediment: it is composed of disassociated ions moving along with the flow. It may, however, constitute a significant proportion (often several percent, but occasionally greater than half) of the total amount of material being transported by the stream.