Research project SR/34/163 (Research action SR)
In land and water management, evapotranspiration monitoring is highly expected, as it is useful for local water balance estimation, early drought detection and crop yield monitoring. Evapotranspiration monitoring at both high temporal and spatial sampling is expected, while no operational product actually address that issue. In a previous study (PROBA-VET project, [1]), the potential of using a half-hourly evapotranspiration estimate based on MSG/SEVIRI satellite in combination with variables retrieved from moderate resolution satellites for the monitoring of evapotranspiration at the sub-kilometre scale has been demonstrated at two test sites.
Scientific question 1
Can we combine such information to obtain both high temporal and medium resolution ET through a generic method suitable for application at large scale, i.e. valid for different land cover and climatic zones?
Objective 1
The main scientific objective EVA3M intends to address is to answer this question, starting from the method set-up in the Proba-VET project (Ghilain et al., 2012) by applying it to a set of validation sites in Europe, improving it if necessary, and applying it to 4 tests sites in Europe and Africa (see form 8).
Scientific question 2
Can we determine the different advantages and drawbacks of the different sensors at moderate resolution for ET monitoring with the proposed approach?
Objective 2:
The applicability of different sensors at moderate resolution will be evaluated, and an inter-comparison of the sensors performances toward the accurate monitoring of evapotranspiration over complex irrigated zones in Europe and Africa will be done.
Scientific question 3
What is the impact and benefits for users applications of the proposed methodology as opposed to a forward application of the evapotranspiration model with downscaled input?
Objective question 3:
We will study the benefits and accuracy of two downscaling schemes: an application of the evapotranspiration model developed in the mother project with downscaled input (ab initio and physical approach), and the downscaling of the output as in objective 1 (a posteriori and statistical).
