Skip to main content
ARS Home » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #126277
Title: UTILITY OF REMOTE SENSING IN MODELING SPATIAL PATTERNS OF EVAPOTRANSPIRATION

Author
item Kustas, William - Bill
item BINDLISH, RAJAT - SSAI-USDA-ARS
item French, Andrew

Submitted to: American Meteorological Society of the Conference on Hydrology Proceedings
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 10/5/2001
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Over the last several years a Two-Source (soil + vegetation) Energy Balance (TSEB) modeling scheme has been developed and tested using either microwave-derived near-surface soil moisture (TSEBsm) or radiometric surface temperature (TSEBtr) as the key surface boundary condition. Output of the surface heat fluxes from both schemes are compared using microwave and radiometric surface temperature observations collected during the 1997 Southern Great Plains experiment (SGP97) conducted in Oklahoma, USA. Results from the heat flux comparisons and simulated versus observed surface temperatures suggest revisions to the TSEBsm scheme are needed to better constrain flux predictions from the soil and vegetation in order to accommodate a wider range of environmental conditions. However, there remain significant discrepancies in heat flux output between the two models. This is due in part to the inconsistencies in the heat flux estimates from the TSEBtr scheme, primarily in the partitioning of the available energy at the soil surface under the higher fractional vegetative cover conditions. Under this condition, the TSEBsm scheme might give more realistic heat flux partitioning for the soil surface.