Temporal sequence transformer to advance long-term streamflow prediction (Papers Track) Best ML Innovation
Ruhaan Singh (Farragut High School); Dan Lu (Oak Ridge National Laboratory); Kshitij Tayal (Oak Ridge National Laboratory)
Abstract
Accurate streamflow prediction is crucial for understanding climate change impacts on water resources and for effective management of extreme hydrological events. While Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) networks have been the dominant data-driven approach for streamflow forecasting, recent advancements in transformer architectures for time series tasks have shown promise in outperforming traditional LSTM models. This study introduces a transformer-based model that integrates historical streamflow data with climatic variables to enhance streamflow prediction accuracy. We evaluated our transformer model against a benchmark LSTM across five diverse basins in the United States. Results demonstrate that the transformer architecture consistently outperforms the LSTM model across all evaluation metrics, highlighting its potential as a more effective tool for hydrological forecasting. This research contributes to the ongoing development of advanced AI techniques for improved water resource management and climate change adaptation strategies.