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ET = E + T
Basic physical principles
◦ Conservation of mass
◦ Conservation of energy
◦ Ideal Gas Law related to water vapor
◦ Latent heat of phasa change
◦ Turbulent transfer near the ground – (diffusion of
momentum…) Conservation of Mass
17,27T
es (T ) 611exp Pa
237,3 T
Relative humidity : vapor pressure relative to
saturation vapor pressure (usually expressed
as %)
e
Rh
es (T )
◦ Fs = shelter factor
◦ LAI = Leaf Area Index
Important distinction between potential and actual
evapotranspiration :
◦ Potential Evaporation (Ep) and Potential Transpiration (Tp)
Rate of evaporation that would occur from a uniformly wet,
large area of soil
Rate of transpiration occuring from a large area completely
covered with vegetation with access to unlimited water
supply
◦ Actual Evaporation (Ea) and Actual Transpiration (Ta)
Actual evaporation takes into account water supply
limitations at the soil surface
Actual transpiration accounts for limited supply of water to
roots and represents field conditions
PET can be considered a drying power
No good direct measurement method
Methods :
◦ Pan Observed changes in water “level”
◦ Water balance
Calculate from weather data
◦ Mass transfer approach
◦ Energy balances approach
◦ Combination – Penman Monteith
◦ Eddy correlation
Relate to an index
◦ Temperature index – Thornthwaite
◦ Radiation index – Priestley Taylor
Pan estimates for potential E are based on the
adjustment of pan measurements
◦ Kp is a crop or pan coefficient,
Eto k p E pan defined as the ratio of the actual
to the pan evaporation
◦ Values for kp vary with season
Where :
and location of interest
Et o: Actual E over open ◦ Kp for some areas in Idaho, US :
water in potential rate
Month Kp
Epan : direct observation April 0,75
of water loss from pan May 0,86
June 0,92
July 0,94
Watershed water balance method applied for
large regions and long time periods
◦ Measurements over a watershed
can be used to estimate actual
evaporation (ETo) over large
areas :
ETo P Q G
G : changes in groundwater
: changes in soil water
◦ For long-term estimates with no
changes in storage (G or ) :
ETo P Q
H K H (Ts Ta )
LE K E (es ea )
ca P (Ts Ta )
0,622v (es ea )
= psychrometric constant