Estimation of sensible heat flux using two and three components model during Monsoon´90 Experiment

Accurate partitioning of the available energy at the surface into sensible and latent heat flux is crucial to the understanding of the interactions between the hydrological cycle and climate processes at regional and global scale. This is however a challenging task in arid and semi-arid regions. The parameterization of the interactions between the surface and the atmosphere in such areas requires different schemes depending on the distribution of the vegetation within the surface. For a surface with sparse and homogeneously distributed vegetation, two components model is certainly the most appropriate one. However, when the vegetation distribution is non uniform (patchy surfaces), the exchange between the bare soil patch and the atmosphere takes place with little interaction with the adjacent vegetation, in this case, three components model is required. The objective of this paper is to validate this concept using data taken over two different sites `Kendall and Lucky Hills´, during the Monsoon´90 Experiment. The vegetation was sparse in both sites but its distribution was homogeneous at Kendall and heterogeneous at Lucky Hills