Article ID Journal Published Year Pages File Type
4527083 Advances in Water Resources 2006 19 Pages PDF
Abstract

We use Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection radiometer (ASTER) data to estimate spatial energy flux and evaporation distributions at the Salar de Atacama, a playa in Northern Chile. Our approach incorporates ASTER surface kinetic temperature, emissivity, and reflectance data, ground-based meteorological measurements, and empirical parameters. Energy flux distributions are estimated using either spatially constant or spatially distributed values of model parameters, with spatially distributed parameters assigned separately to each land cover category in an image classification. We test the sensitivity of energy budget calculations to state variable and parameter values by conducting Monte Carlo simulations for regions with ground energy budget measurements. Results show that assigning spatially distributed model parameters via land cover classifications yields significant improvements to ground and sensible heat flux predictions. Latent heat fluxes cannot, however, be predicted with sufficient accuracy to allow estimation of area-integrated evaporative moisture loss at this low-evaporation playa.

Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering Earth and Planetary Sciences Earth-Surface Processes
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