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ARS Home » Northeast Area » Beltsville, Maryland (BARC) » Beltsville Agricultural Research Center » Hydrology and Remote Sensing Laboratory » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #337528
Title: A Thermal-based Two-Source Energy Balance Model for Estimating Evapotranspiration over Complex Canopies

Author
item Kustas, William - Bill
item Anderson, Martha
item NIETO, H. - Parco Scientifico E Tecnologico Della Sicilia
item ANDREU, A. - United Nations University
item Yang, Yun
item CARMMALLERI, C. - Collaborator
item Alfieri, Joseph
item Gao, Feng
item HAIN, C. - Goddard Space Flight Center
item TORRES, A. - Water Research Institute

Submitted to: European Geosciences Union General Assembly Proceedings
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 1/30/2017
Publication Date: 3/2/2017
Citation: Kustas, W.P., Anderson, M.C., Nieto, H., Andreu, A., Yang, Y., Carmmalleri, C., Alfieri, J.G., Gao, F.N., Hain, C., Torres, A. 2017. A Thermal-based Two-Source Energy Balance Model for Estimating Evapotranspiration over Complex Canopies. European Geosciences Union General Assembly Proceedings. /EGU2017/EGU2017-2973.pdf.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Land surface temperature (LST) provides valuable information for quantifying root-zone water availability, evapotranspiration (ET) and crop condition as well as providing useful information for constraining prognostic land surface models. This presentation describes a robust but relatively simple LST-based land surface model called the Two-Source Energy Balance (TSEB) model. The TSEB algorithms solve for the soil/substrate and canopy temperatures that achieves a balance in the radiation and turbulent heat flux exchange for the soil/substrate and vegetation elements coupled to the lower atmosphere. As a result, the TSEB modeling framework is applicable to a wide range of environmental and canopy cover conditions, which has been a limitation in many other LST-based energy balance approaches. This is particularly relevant in applying surface energy balance models using LST over heterogeneous landscapes with complex vegetation distribution and architecture/structure. An overview of applications of the TSEB modeling framework to a variety of landscapes will be presented. In addition, a modeling system will be described called the Atmosphere-Land Exchange Inverse (ALEXI) that couples the TSEB scheme with an atmospheric boundary layer model in time-differencing mode to routinely map continental-scale daily ET at 5 to 10-km resolution using geostationary satellites. A related algorithm (DisALEXI) spatially disaggregates ALEXI output down to 'ner spatial resolutions using polar orbiting satellites such as Landsat, which provides pixel resolutions at the scale of human management activities affecting land use\land cover.