IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jlands/v11y2022i11p1903-d954140.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Correlation Analysis of Evapotranspiration, Emissivity Contrast and Water Deficit Indices: A Case Study in Four Eddy Covariance Sites in Italy with Different Environmental Habitats

Author

Listed:
  • Michele Torresani

    (Faculty of Science and Technology, Free University of Bolzano/Bozen, Piazza Università/Universitätsplatz 1, 39100 Bolzano/Bozen, Italy
    Department of Civil, Environmental and Mechanical Engineering, University of Trento, 38123 Trento, Italy)

  • Guido Masiello

    (School of Engineering, University of Basilicata, Via Ateneo Lucano 10, 85100 Potenza, Italy)

  • Nadia Vendrame

    (Center Agriculture Food Environment (C3A), University of Trento, 38010 San Michele All’Adige, Italy)

  • Giacomo Gerosa

    (Department of Mathematics and Physics, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, 25121 Brescia, Italy)

  • Marco Falocchi

    (Cisma S.r.l., Via Ipazia 2 c/o NOI Techpark, 39100 Bolzano, Italy)

  • Enrico Tomelleri

    (Faculty of Science and Technology, Free University of Bolzano/Bozen, Piazza Università/Universitätsplatz 1, 39100 Bolzano/Bozen, Italy)

  • Carmine Serio

    (School of Engineering, University of Basilicata, Via Ateneo Lucano 10, 85100 Potenza, Italy)

  • Duccio Rocchini

    (BIOME Lab., Department of Biological, Geological and Environmental Sciences, Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna, Via Irnerio 42, 40126 Bologna, Italy
    Department of Spatial Sciences, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Kamýcka 129, 16500 Praha, Czech Republic)

  • Dino Zardi

    (Department of Civil, Environmental and Mechanical Engineering, University of Trento, 38123 Trento, Italy
    Center Agriculture Food Environment (C3A), University of Trento, 38010 San Michele All’Adige, Italy)

Abstract

Evapotranspiration (ET) represents one of the essential processes controlling the exchange of energy by terrestrial vegetation, providing a strong connection between energy and water fluxes. Different methodologies have been developed in order to measure it at different spatial scales, ranging from individual plants to an entire watershed. In the last few years, several methods and approaches based on remotely sensed data have been developed over different ecosystems for the estimation of ET. In the present work, we outline the correlation between ET measured at four eddy covariance (EC) sites in Italy (situated either in forest or in grassland ecosystems) and (1) the emissivity contrast index (ECI) based on emissivity data from thermal infrared spectral channels of the MODIS and ASTER satellite sensors (CAMEL data-set); (2) the water deficit index (WDI), defined as the difference between the surface and dew point temperature modeled by the ECMWF (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts) data. The analysis covers a time-series of 1 to 7 years depending on the site. The results showed that both the ECI and WDI correlate to the ET calculated through EC. In the relationship WDI-ET, the coefficient of determination ranges, depending on the study area, between 0.5 and 0.9, whereas it ranges between 0.5 and 0.7 when ET was correlated to the ECI. The slope and the sign of the latter relationship is influenced by the vegetation habitat, the snow cover (particularly in winter months) and the environmental heterogeneity of the area (calculated in this study through the concept of the spectral variation hypothesis using Rao’s Q heterogeneity index).

Suggested Citation

  • Michele Torresani & Guido Masiello & Nadia Vendrame & Giacomo Gerosa & Marco Falocchi & Enrico Tomelleri & Carmine Serio & Duccio Rocchini & Dino Zardi, 2022. "Correlation Analysis of Evapotranspiration, Emissivity Contrast and Water Deficit Indices: A Case Study in Four Eddy Covariance Sites in Italy with Different Environmental Habitats," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-16, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jlands:v:11:y:2022:i:11:p:1903-:d:954140
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/11/11/1903/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/11/11/1903/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Guido Masiello & Francesco Ripullone & Italia De Feis & Angelo Rita & Luigi Saulino & Pamela Pasquariello & Angela Cersosimo & Sara Venafra & Carmine Serio, 2022. "The IASI Water Deficit Index to Monitor Vegetation Stress and Early Drying in Summer Heatwaves: An Application to Southern Italy," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(8), pages 1-18, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Yufen Ma & Wei Han & Zhenglong Li & E. Eva Borbas & Ali Mamtimin & Yongqiang Liu, 2023. "Evaluation of CAMEL over the Taklimakan Desert Using Field Observations," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(6), pages 1-21, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Julia S. Stoyanova & Christo G. Georgiev & Plamen N. Neytchev, 2023. "Drought Monitoring in Terms of Evapotranspiration Based on Satellite Data from Meteosat in Areas of Strong Land–Atmosphere Coupling," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(1), pages 1-21, January.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jlands:v:11:y:2022:i:11:p:1903-:d:954140. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.