Effect of Environmental Measurement Uncertainty on Prediction of Evapotranspiration

Abstract

Evapotranspiration (ET) is a typical biological environmental process to influence leaf temperature, crop water requirement, and greenhouse microclimate. Affecting factors of ET include air temperature, air relative humidity, wind speed, solar radiation, longwave radiation, soil moisture, CO2 concentration, and crop state. In this study, two ET models of indoor cultivation commonly adopted in literature were selected to evaluate the effect of the performance of sensors on the model uncertainty. The method of the International Organization for Standardization, Guides to the expression of Uncertainty in Measurement (ISO GUM) was adopted. The result indicated that the performance of leaf area index (LAI) and solar radiation (Is) sensors were primary sources of uncertainty. The uncertainty of ET models due to sensor performance needs to be considered. To ensure the predictive ability for applying the ET model for crops irrigation management and greenhouse environmental control, the improvements in the measurement of environmental variables for calculating ET would be of particular importance. The method of this study can be used for evaluating the uncertainty of ET models that calculate ET based on environmental variables measured by meteorological sensors or the remote sensing technique.