The accuracy of temporal upscaling of instantaneous evapotranspiration to daily values with seven upscaling methods

Abstract

Abstract. This study evaluated the accuracy of seven upscaling methods in simulating daily latent heat flux (LE) from instantaneous values using observations from 148 global sites under all sky conditions and at different times during the day. Daily atmospheric transmissivity (τ) was used to represent the sky conditions. The results showed that all seven methods could accurately simulate daily LE from instantaneous values. The mean and median of Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency were 0.80 and 0.85, respectively, and the corresponding determination coefficients were 0.87 and 0.90, respectively. The sine and Gaussian function methods simulated mean values with relatively higher accuracy, with relative errors generally within ±10 %. The evaporative fraction (EF) methods, which use potential evapotranspiration and incoming shortwave radiation, performed relatively better than the other methods in simulating daily series. Overall, the EF method using potential evapotranspiration had the highest accuracy. However, the sine function and the EF method using extraterrestrial solar irradiance are recommended in upscaling applications because of the relatively minimal data requirements of these methods and their comparable or relatively higher accuracy. The intra-day distribution of the LE showed greater consistency with the Gaussian function than the sine function. However, the accuracy of simulated daily LE series using the Gaussian function method did not improve significantly compared with the sine function method. The simulation accuracy showed a minor difference when using the same type of method, for example, the same type of mathematical function or EF method. In any upscaling scheme, the simulation accuracy from multi-time values was significantly higher than that from a single-time value. Therefore, when multi-time data are available, multi-time values should be used in evapotranspiration upscaling. The upscaling methods show the ability to accurately simulate daily LE from instantaneous values from 09:00 to 15:00, particularly for instantaneous values between 11:00 and 14:00. However, outside of this time range the upscaling methods performed poorly. These methods can simulate daily LE series with high accuracy at τ > 0.6; when τ < 0.6, simulation accuracy is significantly affected by sky conditions and is generally positively related to daily atmospheric transmissivity. Although every upscaling scheme can accurately simulate daily LE from instantaneous values at most sites, this ability is lost at tropical rainforest and tropical monsoon sites.