Influence of short-term surface temperature dynamics on tree orchards energy balance fluxes

Land surface temperature (LST) plays an essential role in developing and applying precision agriculture protocols, especially for calculating crop evapotranspiration (ETc) by surface energy balance (SEB) approaches; and for determining crop water status. However, LST is quite dependent on the meteorological conditions, which can rapidly vary. This variability, together with the limited meterological data acquisition frequency in most weather stations, can lead to the miscalculation of the SEB components, especially relevant when used for irrigation purposes. The present study assessed the temporal dynamic of LST in a very short period of time (20-minutes) through the acquisition of multiple thermal imagery. Additionally, a combination of SEB approach with Eddy Covariance technique was performed for quantifying the effect that LST variations have on the sensible (H) and latent (LE) heat fluxes. Even under steady meteorological conditions, temporal variations in LST of 3.5 and 4.0 K were observed for tree canopy and sunny bare soil surfaces, respectively. These LST oscillations reached values of about 7.8 and 17.9 K for tree canopies and bare soil when heterogeneous meteorological conditions were observed (i.e. cloud presence). Such LST differences translated into H and LE differences of about 26 and 19%, respectively; with variations up to 5 (for H) and 2.7 times (for LE) under fast-varying meteorological conditions. The obtained results suggest the necessity of acquiring thermal imagery when steady meteorological conditions exist or, otherwise, ensuring the collection of instantaneous meteorological data for applying post-processing corrections. This is of importance when incorporating the obtained ETc maps into precision irrigation protocols.

This study was supported by the Research Project of National Relevance (PRIN 2017) titled “INtegrated Computer modeling and monitoring for Irrigation Planning in Italy - INCIPIT”; and by the project PRECIRIEGO RTC-2017-6365-2 financed by AEI with FEDER co-funds. The authors thank the Consiglio per la Ricerca in agricoltura e l’analisi dell’Economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Olivicoltura, Frutticoltura e Agrumicoltura (CREA-OFA) for their hospitality at the experimental site. J.M.R.-C. and D.V. acknowledge the postdoctoral financial support received from Juan de la Cierva Spanish Postdoctoral Program (IJC2020-043601-I), and from Programma Operativo Nazionale (PON) “Attraction and International Mobility” (AIM) 1848200-2 initiative, respectively.