Högskolan i Skövde

Climate change has impacted global temperatures, triggering extreme weather and adverse environmental effects. In Sweden, these changes have caused shifts in weather patterns, leading to disruptions in infrastructure. This, in turn, has influenced water turbidity levels, negatively impacting water quality. To tackle these issues, a study was conducted using machine learning to predict turbidity with six meteorological variables collected for two years. Our preliminary research showed a substantial influence of seasonal changes on water turbidity, especially air temperature. Identifying supporting indicators such as lagged features is crucial and considerably improved the turbidity prediction performance for two of the machine learning models used. However, the study also identified challenges like data collection and uncertainty issues. We recommend improving data collection quality with higher frequency, minimizing geographical gaps between data collection points, sharing calibration assumptions, checking the sensors regularly, and accounting for data anomalies. Understanding these challenges and their potential implications could lead to more methodological enhancements.