Estimation Of Sensible Heat Flux From The Surface Temperature Wave And One-Time-Of-Day Air Temperature Observation, Part Ii – Heterogeneous Surfaces

By means of the algorithm presented in Part I of this study, the temporal course H(t) and the daily mean H of the sensible heat flux H can be determined from measurements of the thermodynamic surface temperature (as a function of time) and from a one-time-of-day air temperature observation. Inaddition to these temperatures, one needs estimates of daily mean wind speed,of the roughness lengths of momentum and heat transfer, and of the displacementheight. In Part I, the algorithm was derived for areas with homogeneous surfaces,i.e., with uniform surface temperature, and the method was verified with measurements taken during several field campaigns. The root mean square error for the temperature difference between surface and air, in the comparison between measurement and model, amounted to one or two kelvin, and the error of H was 10 to 25 per cent. The method can be used to determine the sensible heat flux from measurements of surface temperatures by satellites, but can also be applied to ground based measurements.In Part II, the procedure is generalized for areas that consist of various surface types (sub-regions) with different surface temperatures, and can be usedwhen only a few (at least one) air temperature measurements per day are available over only one of the different sub-regions. This generalization should allow improvements to the estimates for H(t) by means of temperature measurements from, e.g., NOAA/AVHRR or LANDSAT/TM, taking into account the heterogeneity of the area contained in one METEOSAT pixel. Criteria are given as to whether effective (areal mean) surface temperatures and roughness lengths may be used for the computation of H or if the above mentioned generalized procedure has to be applied. The new algorithm is verified by measurements sampled during the field campaigns EFEDA 91 (Spain) and HIBE 89 (Hildesheimer Börde in Germany), and by using synthetic data (due to the lack of measured data) for one further combined surfacetype soil and water (lakes)].