Photonirvachak

Journal of the Indian Society of Remote Sensing, Vol. 31, No. 2, 2003

A Simple Surface Energy Balance to Derive

Evapotranspiration from Remote Sensing and
Conventional Meteorological Observations
C.V. SRINIVAS t, K.P.R. VITTAL MURTY z and Y.V.N. KRISHNA MURTY 3
~Atmospheric Studies Section, Safety Physics Division,
Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research, Kalpakkam - 603102, India
2Department of Meteorology and Oceanography, Andhra University, Visakhapatnam - 530 003, India
3Regional Remote Sensing Service Centre (RRSSC), Deparment of Space, Nagpur - 440 010, India

ABSTRACT
Monthly mean measurements of surface temperature, albedo and normalized difference
vegetation index (NDVI) of NOAA AVHRR are processed for Maharashtra. These data are
used in combination with monthly average surface meteorological observations in a surface
energy balance model to estimate monthly mean actual evapotranspiration (AET) from
different climatic zones of Maharasthra,. India. AET is estimated between April and
December months for two contrasting monsoons in 1992 and 1995. Estimates reasonably
agree with pan evaporation data during growing season and with AET estimated from water
balance procedure. AET is low in semi-arid dry land areas of central Maharashtra and
significantly high in the humid-perhumid western ghat region and subhumid eastern
Maharashtra region. The modeled evapotranspiration show the influence of seasonal
vegetation in different climatic zones from the region. The method can be used to obtain
large-scale evapotranspiration with minimum ground observations.

Introduction

Evapotranspiration (ET) is one of the key

variables that regulate energy and mass exchange
in the Land-Biosphere-Atmosphere continuum.
Local rate of evapotranspiration (ET) is a
Recd. 11 Aug., 2002; in final form Feb., 2003

complex phenomenon and less understood aspect

of hydrological cycle at large scale (Rasool and
Bolle, 1984; Avissar and Pielke, 1989;
Ramakrishna
and
Running,
1989).
Evapotranspiration fluxes are important for the
determination of water use by plants at local
level as well as in the large-scale circulation of
the planetary atmosphere (Jarvis and Mc

130

C.V. Srinivas et al.

Naughton, 1986). Land surface is covered

significantly with regions characterized by
partial or sparse plant canopy (Dickinson, 1983).
A seasonal character of such a phenomenon
occurs in all agricultural areas and they occur
naturally throughout the year in arid and semiarid regions of the globe (Wilson and
Handerson-Sellers,
1985). The relative
contributions to the total ET from the soil and
plant components can vary throughout a season.
Tropical forests consume considerable amount of
net radiation for evapotranspiration and reliable
estimates of ET are important for assessment of
hydrological cycle, for studying global climatic
change and for effective management of water
resources and productivity of a region.
Local estimates of potential ET (PET) are
obtained through empirical methods with the
available meteorological data using physical
principles (Penman, 1948). However, ET is a
complex biophysical process and the type and
structure of vegetation can limit the rate of
evaporation. Actual ET (AET) is related to PET
through soil moisture which in turn by
precipitation, soil properties and vegetation
conditions. Physiographic, micrometeorological
and biophysical conditions govern the AET
within a given ecosystem. Estimation of land
surface fluxes, particularly evaporation rates
becomes complex with decreasing scale as the
surface features and processes tend to become
more complex. Surface energy balance (SEB)
models contain more variables than are easily
specified or observed (Tarpley, 1994). The insitu
measurements over homogeneous areas are not
applicable to large areas having diverse climatic
and land cover scenario. In this respect, the
remote sensing based spectral data coupled
energy balance models provide a viable means
for mapping of spatial distribution and
quantitative assessment of ET from local to
regional scales.
Evaluation of regional scale ET using
Remote sensing data gained importance as the
observations provide synoptic coverage and are

multi-temporal in nature (Hall et al., 1991).

Observations collected in visible, near infrared
and thermal infrared wave bands provide
essential data on vegetation cover, albedo, land
surface temperature which are required for
energy balance modeling and evapotranspiration
estimation (Kant and Badarinath, 1998). The
combination of surface meteorological data and
remotely sensed observations enables to the
direct evaluation of net radiation, sensible heat
flux, latent heat flux and soil/ground heat flux.
Here, a simple surface energy balance model
(Tarpley, 1994) is used with satellite and
conventional meteorological data to calculate
monthly average evapotranspiration from
different climatic zones of Maharashtra. The
model analysis is done for two contrasting
monsoon years 1992 and 1995. The model is
modified and includes the remotely sensed data
on land surface temperature, albedo in addition
to the vegetation index and roughness parameter.
The method has the advantage that no ancillary
soil moisture model is required and calculates ET
directly. The estimated ET is compared with
available ground based observations and those
obtained by conventional empirical methods.

Surface Energy Balance Model

The evapotranspiration process is governed
by energy exchange at the vegetation surface and
is limited by the amount of surface energy
available. At high resolution, variability in soils,
vegetation, terrain and local meteorology have
significant effects. It is intended to use satellite
observations at a spatial resolution of 1.1 km and
monthly time scale to evaluate the surface energy
fluxes. At these spatial and time scales the
variability of surface features and day to day
weather will average out considerably and a
simple model may be adequate. The conservation
of energy across the land-atmosphere interface is
expressed as
Rn+H+LE+G=0

(1)

where R~ is the Net Radiation at the surface, H is

A Simple Surface Energy Balance to Derive...

the Sensible Heat Flux, LE is the Latent Heat
Flux and G is the Soil Heat flux. The fluxes are
considered to be positive when energy is
transferred toward the surface and negative in
case of transfer away from the surface. The net
radiation term in equation (1) is given by
Rn = Qs(1-or + ~

a O"

T~4 - ~

OTsfc 4

(2)

where Qs is insolation at the surface, o, is the

surface albedo, a is the Stefan-Boltzman
constant, ~ a i s the atmospheric emissivity, ~ is
the surface emissivity, T, is the air temperature
and Tsfr is the surface temperature. Here Qs is
given by
Qs = [as+bs (n/N)] Qa

(3)

where n is actual duration of sunshine [hours], N

is maximum possible duration of sunshine
[hours], n/N is relative sunshine duration and Qa
is extra-terrestrial radiation, as is regression
constant expressing
the
fraction of
extraterrestrial radiation reaching the earth on
overcast days (n=0), (as + bs) is fraction of
extraterrestrial radiation reaching the earth on
clear days (n=N). Depending on atmospheric
conditions (humidity, dust) and solar radiation
(latitude and month), the Angstrom values as and
bs will vary. For Indian conditions based on
regression analysis (IMD, 1982) the values for as
= 0.32 and bs = 0.43 are used. The extraterrestrial
radiation, Qa, for each day of the year and for
different latitudes can be estimated from the
solar constant, the solar declination and the time
of the year by
Qa = [24 x 60/r] Qo dr [cos sin(qS) sin(/i) + cos(~b)
cos(6) sin (co s)]
(4)
where Qo is solar constant (=1367 Wm2), dr is
inverse relative Earth-Sun distance, co s is sunset
hour angle, j latitude in radians, d is solar
declination in radians. The inverse relative EarthSun distance dr, and the solar declination d vary
with the number of the day 'J' of the year as
given by
dr = 1 + 0.033 x cos [(2r/365) J
= 0.409 x sin [ (2r/365) J-1.39]

13!

An empirical equation (Idso, 1981) is used

to estimate atmospheric emissivity,
ea = 0.70+5.95 10-5 ea exp(1500/T,)

(5)

where ea is vapour pressure in millibars. The

sensible heat flux is derived from the
aerodynamic theory of turbulent transfer. In
finite difference form the flux equation for
neutral stability is
H = -Cp K

(Tsfr - I'z -

T,)

(6)

where, Cp is specific heat of air at constant

pressure and F is Dry-adiabatic lapse rate, Tsfc is
the surface temperature and T, is the air
temperature. The turbulent transfer coefficient K
is given by
K = [p k 2 Ul/[ln (Z/Co)] z

(7)

where k is yon Karman's constant = 0.4, r is air

density, U is mean wind speed, Z is elevation
above the surface at which U is measured, s is
Stefan-Boltzmann constant -- 4.903 x 1 0 - 9
[MJK"4 m "2 dayt]. The roughness length (Zo) is
spatially and seasonally variable. Zo is scaled by
monthly average NDVI (Tarpley, 1994).
Z o = Zm[| +(NDVI-Vmm)/(Vm~x-Vmm)]

(8)

where Zm, Vn~x and Vmi~ are the minimum

roughness, the maximum monthly NDVI and
minimum monthly NDVI respectively. The
scaling assumes that normally the vegetation
growth changes with season and vegetation
height is proportional to NDVI, therefore Zo also
varies proportionally between minimum and
maximum according to the value of NDVI. A
minimum roughness is used to tune the model
according to the major land cover. The soil heat
flux is given by
G =-(Ks/d) x (Tsfc-T~)

(9)

where Ks is soil thermal conductivity which

varies with the type of the soil (sandy, loamy,
clayey, peat). The macroscopic thermal
conductivity of soil depends upon its mineral
composition and organic matter content, as well
as on the volume fractions of water and air. An
average value of Ks --- 0.3 (W m "t K) (van Wijk

132

C.V. Srinivas et al.

and de Vries, 1963) is assumed for the soils of

the study area. d is the distance to the bottom of
the first soil layer (= 5 cm), TI is the temperature
at depth (d) and Tsfc is the land surface
temperature. The model is a fairly simple
treatment of the SEB. The wind speed is
specified at 10 m and temperatures at 2 m above
the surface. The wind speed is defined in the
turbulent transfer theory to be the mean value
without turbulent ~'luctuations.

Study Area
The study area, Maharashtra lies between
15~ 44'and 21 ~ 40' N latitudes and 73 ~ 15' and

80 ~ 3Y E longitudes and forms a major part of

peninsular India with an area of about 3,04,391
square kilometers (Figure 1). The study area has
four climatic zones i.e., Sub-humid to Semi-arid
in the Vidarbha region of Eastern Maharashtra
(Region R1), Semi-arid in the Central
Maharashtra (Region R2) and Perhumid along
the Konkan coast plains, Humid to Perhumid
transition zone along the Western Ghats (Region
R3) (IMD, 1986). There is a strong east-west
gradient of rainfall across Maharashtra. The
rainy season is confined to southwest monsoon,
80 percent of the rainfall is received during June
to September (Raman, 1974). The rainfall ranges
from 450 mm in rain shadow areas to 2500 mm

1500
c~
Nal~ur

Parbhani

500

Latu r

District boundary
Annual rainfall (ram)
I"1 Sampling sites
,../

tO
Fig. 1. Location map of Maharashtra with Isohytes and sampling sites

A Simple Surface EnergyBalance to Derive...

133

in Western Ghats. The rainfall pattem gradually

increases from central towards eastern parts of
the state ranging from 700 to 1500 mm. Studies
of ET in this state gain significance in view of
wide variation in physiography, climate, soils
and land cover conditions.

where 6w and ~
are water vapour and
emissivity correction respectively, calculated as
suggested by Gutman (1994)

Data and Methodology

Here T4 and Ts are the brightness

temperatures in the thermal infra-red channels 4
(10.3-11.3 ~tm) and 5 (11.5-12.5 lam). The
weekly meteorological data for maximum,
minimum temperatures, wind speed, sunshine
hours, soil temperature at 5 cm depth of 32
locations spread in the 4 meteorological subdivisions of Maharashtra were averaged at
monthly intervals and spatially interpolated for
integrating with satellite data. The AVHRR data
were co-registered from topographical sheets at
1:1 million scale using Lambert's Conformal
Conic (LCC) earth projection.

Climatological analysis requires sufficient

data to make averages of the observed quantities.
In the present study AVHRR global land data set
of 1.1 km resolution is used (USGS, 1993). The
data consists of 10 day arrays of mapped
AVHRR data that is originally preprocessed for
cloud screening by maximum vegetation index
and atmospheric corrections. Monthly averages
were calculated from the above data sets for
perceivable changes in biophysical quantifies.
The data set consists of channels 1 and 2 in the
visible and near infra-red converted to
reflectance values and channels 4 and 5 in
thermal infrared converted to brightness
temperatures following inverse Plank's relation.
Using the visible and near-infrared bands a
surface vegetation index (NDVI) was derived as
the normalized difference of the two reflectances
R1 and R2 in bands 1 (0.58-0.68 pm) and 2
(0.725-1.10~tm).
NDVI = (R2-R1)/(R2+R1)

(10)

Surface albedo was obtained from the

spectral reflectance in visible (A1) and nearinfrared bands (A2) according to Saunders
(1990),
A = 0.5(AI+ A2)

(1 I)

Using the thermal infrared data mean

monthly surface temperature was derived by a
split window algorithm (Becker and Li, 1990)
which accounts the surface emissivity variation
(d r from NDVI (Van de Griend and Owe,
1993)
TS = T4 +tSw + ~E

(12)

r -- 1.009 + 0.047 ln(NDVI)

(13)

/~w = 2.63 (T4-Ts) + 1.274

(14)

6~ = [0.078(T4 + %) + 1.69(T4-Ts)] (1-~)/~ (15)

Results and discussion

The surface temperatures for 10 sites

ranging from the Perhumid to dry semi-arid in
Maharashtra are shown in Fig. 2a. The surface
temperatures show a distinctive seasonal
variation that was similar at all sites with high
temperatures during the summer months and less
during the winter months. A regular variation
from west to east in the surface temperature was
observed according to the aridity of the site. The
semi-arid locations have higher temperatures
than the sub-humid and humid/perhumid
locations. Fig. 2c shows the monthly mean
NDVI for the same locations in Maharashtra.
The NDVI was larger in the west Coast plains
and in the eastern region where the rainfall is
higher, it decreased toward the central semi-arid
region. The NDVI reached a maximum in
September-October and a secondary maximum
in December at all locations, probably due to the
growth of summer and winter crops. The albedo
was high in the pre-monsoon season (AprilJune), decreased to low values in the rainy
season (July to October) and increased again in
November, the higher albedo coincided with the

134

C.V. Srinivas et al.

Fig. 2a. Seasonal variation of surface temperture in Maharashtra

Fig. 2b. Seasonal variation of Albedo in Maharashtra

A Simple Surface Energy Balance to Derive...

harvesting time of summer and winter crops (Fig.
2b), Albedo was higher in the semi-arid central
Maharashtra having 10w rainfall and decreased
toward the humid west coast plains and the subhumid eastern region. A steady progression in
the quantities was noticed from the central region
to the eastern and western regions, the surface
temperature and albedo decreased and the NDVI
increased.
The evapotranspiration varied significantly

135

in different climatic zones of Maharashtra (Fig.

3). The mean evapotranspiration was low in the
central semi-arid dry land zone compared to the
eastern sub-humid and western humid zones in
both 1992 and 1995. The AET was higher in the
humid western ghats and Konkan coast plains
than the sub-humid eastern Maharasthra in 1995
where it was vice versa in 1992 (Fig. 4). The
estimated AET was lower in 1992 than in 1995
(Table 1) which may be due to the low annual
rainfall in 1992. AET followed the NDVI pattern

Table 1. Mean monthly evapotranspiration (SEB) in different climatic zones in Maharashtra in 1992 and 1995.

Region

Evapotranspiration (mm/day)
Year

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

R1

1992

5.27

4.17

5.89

9.35

7.21

5.02

6.06

3.75

2.84

R2

1992

3.80

3.90

4.89

7.56

5.89

4.89

4.38

5.01

2.86

R3

1992

3.86

4.88

6.41

11.13

8.41

7.19

6.79

6.24

3.64

RI

1995

4.62

3,89

5.92

9.07

12.25

7.05

6.84

3.04

2.98

R2

1995

3.59

4.02

4.95

5.77

5.89

6.63

3.72

2.90

2.86

R3

1995

4.67

6.18

6.75

8.21

9.26

8.25

4.32

3.05

2.82

Fig. 2e. Seasonal variation of NDVI in Maharashtra

136

C.V. Srinivas et al.

r
O~
O~

t'~

o
o

~o

._=
0

aa
ga
O0

0
0J

"d

gO

r4
r~

A Simple Surface Energy Balance to Derive...

12-

1992

__~,.

10 "

Maharashtra
---o--- R2 Central Maharashtra
_ A _ R3 Westem ghats and Konkan
- . r ~ - . R1 E a s t e m

--,,,.

~././~""-...~zL-~

E
c 8

//,,.

9~. 6

137

" n.. ~ / ~ ; ~

o....

.."

" 0 . . . . "'-.

.,.,O,,

'-~

t~

,,>,2'

'

Apr

~12

'

May

'

Jun

'

Jul

'

Aug

,-

'

Oct

'

Nov

'

Dec

._o

'

1995

CO

Sep

o.....

O.

o.....

,,

~4
~E 2 "
I

Apr

'

May

'

'

Jun

Jul

'

Aug

'

Sep

'

Oct

'

Nov

'

'

Dec

Fig. 4. Actual evapotranspiration in different climatic zones in Maharashtra during 1992 and 1995

in different climatic zones of Maharashtra.

Comparison of SEB and conventional

methods
Instrumental measurements of evapotranspiration are scarce and their coverage is limited
over a large heterogeneous area of Maharashtra.
So, AET deduced from SEB was compared with
the mean monthly pan evaporation and with AET

obtained from water balance procedure. Pan

evaporation accounts only evaporation
component of potential evapotranspiration when
raised to pan coefficient and represents the net
environmental demand. Pan evaporation was
higher than AET during summer season (April to
June) (Table 2, Fig. 5). The transpiration
component from vegetation as well as the
evaporation from open or barn lands in the nongrowing season is expected to be very low due to

138

C.V. Srinivas et al.

sparse vegetation and poor soil moisture. During

the
monsoon
season
the
actual
evapotranspiration and pan evaporation were in
close agreement. The satellite ET has a
correlation of 0.68 with the pan evaporation.
Obviously, the environmental demand is less in
the humid phase as against the moist, moderately
dry and completely dry periods. Peak growth of
vegetation
generally
occurs
during
September/October months in the tropical
monsoon climatic conditions of India, as is also
evident from the NDVI profile (Fig. 2b).
The pan evaporation was less in R3 and R1
regions having more area under forest vegetation
(Challa et al., 1995) as compared to R2 region
with more area under dry lands and cultivated
lands. The estimated actual evapotranspiration in
R3 and R1 regions was higher than in R2 region,
the R3, R1 regions receive high annual rainfall.
The transpiration component of forest vegetation
contributes to relatively high evapotranpiration
in R3 and R1 regions signifying the biospheric
control on evapotranspiration.
The montly average ET was alternatively
estimated from conventional meteorological and
soil data by applying water balance procedure
(Thomthwaite and Mather, 1955). The soil water
holding capacity of different locations was
obtained from analysed soil information (Challa
et
al.,
1995).
Monthly
potential
evapotranspiration was estimated from montly

mean air temperature, surface wind speed,

relative humidity and net radiation by Penman
(1948) equation. This approach assumes that ET
proceeds at the potential rate when the soil
moisture is at the water holding capacity. Actual
evapotranspiration (AET) is arrived as tSS+P
when ~5S is positive and as PET when bS is
negative, where ~5S is the monthly change in soil
moisture and P is the rainfall. The monthly mean
ET for each month between April and December
by conventional method is shown with the
satellite estimates of ET in Table 3. A correlation
of 0.64 was found between the two estimates
with a standard error of 1.34, mean percentage
error of 35 and RMS error of 2.104. The AET by
SEB is more compared to the one obtained from
water balance procedure. At all locations the
satellite ET peaks higher in the summer than the
conventional ET but this effect decreases from
humid/sub-humid stations to semi-arid stations.
The conventional method gives the point
estimates whereas the satellite based SEB
method gives the aerial estimates of ET, thereby
giving some disagreement. The deviation is also
partly due to cloud contamination of satellite
data, which appeared while averaging the data
from 10-day time composites. Cloud screening
by maximum vegetation index over calendar
periods of 10 days could not eliminate cloud
bands of cyclones in some data in the summer
months from the large area of Maharashtra,
which resulted in the imprecise calculation of ET
in certain months. These are a few limitations in

Table 2. Mean monthly pan evaporation in different climatic zones in Maharashtra in 1992 and 1995
Pan evaporation (mm/day)
Region

Year

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

RI

1992

12.73

13.88

14.13

8.53

4.32

5.02

5.86

5.19

4.06

R2

1992

10.98

12.50

12.06

7.83

4.74

4.40

5.42

5.26

4.34

R3

1992

10.08

10.48

8.83

5.03

2.66

3.00

4.24

4.60

3.97

RI

1995

8.42

10.44

13.48

5.68

4.19

4.89

4.78

5.26

4.03

R2

1995

10.20

11.22

12.10

7.40

5.08

5.29

4.71

5.03

4.52

R3

1995

8.04

8.37

8.89

4.10

2.95

4.10

4.23

4.54

4.03

A Simple Surface Energy Balance to Derive...

139

Table 3. Evapotranspiration (in mm/day) from the conventional (Waterbalance) and from the SEB model in 1992
Month

Nagpur
Conv

SEB

Conv

SEB

Pune

Jalgaon

Chandrapur

Conv

SEB

Cony

Sholapur
SEB

Conv

SEB

Apr

1.8

5.00

2.69

4.22

0.33

3.19

1.03

3.59

1.80

3.89

May

2.9

4.05

3.63

4.08

1.20

3.20

2.14

4.64

1.13

4.04

Jun

1.5

5.83

4.38

6.36

1.78

4.35

2.49

5.15

2.64

3.87

Jul

5.3

9.60

6.6

9.73

6.90

5.33

4.74

7.16

3.52

7.49

Aug

6.2

8.12

6.7

7.35

3.60

4.90

4.19

5.90

5.30

5.40

Sep

3.3

5.10

5.8

6.10

3.70

4.70

3.10

5.40

6.26

3.90

Oct

3.4

4.91

5.9

6.40

4.71

4.50

5.87

4.23

6.41

4,47

Nov

2.4

3.33

5.04

6.90

3.73

2.77

4.73

7.20

5.73

5.80

Dec

1.1

3.58

1.1

2.34

1.92

2.74

1.52

3.25

1.50

2.74

the method. The accuracy in the method can be

improved by following more effective cloud
screening techniques.
Conclusion
Actual evapotranspiration is a crucial
component in hydrological cycle and depends on
the functional processes of biosphere.
Operational estimates of evapotranspiration
require information on vegetation, surface
temperature, albedo and surface roughness in
addition to soil types and micrometeorological
parameters. This study shows that with routinely
available satellite data and conventional
meteorological averages, monthly ET can be
estimated using a simple surface energy balance
model. On the larger scale of 1-kin, spatial
averaging of the meteorological and surface
variables makes a simple model adequate to
describe the processes. The method was chosen
to be as simple as possible while still retaining
the important physics. The estimates have

accounted for the variations of ET in different

climatic zones/ecosystems of the study area. The
accuracy in the estimation can be improved
further by either using cloud free satellite data or
following precise cloud screening techniques.
The required meteorological data -temperature,
specific humidy and windspeed have been
available from operational weather forecast
models which calculate these quantities at lowest
pressure level above the surface and can be
extrapolated down to the reference level at which
energy flux is calculated. The method can be
applied to prepare evapotranspiration maps for
large areas from archived databases such as
NOAA GVI with minimum surface observations.
Acknowledgements
The authors are thankful to the India
Meteorological Department for providing the
meteorological data used in the study. Thanks are
also due to the US Geological Survey for
facilitating NOAA AVHRR data for use in
environmental studies.

140

C.V. Srinivas et al.

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