Evapotranspiration (ET) is an essential component of water cycle as it is an interlinkage between atmosphere, vegetation and soil surface in terms of energy and water balance. However, whether potential ET has the same tendency to change as actual ET and how ET trend (based on the difference between precipitation and runoff) is directly driven by dominant meteorological factors alone or combined with ecosystem‘s feedbacks to climate change (like land-use change) is still under the discussion.
In this report, five ET parameterizations within two rainfall-runoff models [Coupled Heat and Mass Transfer Model (CoupModel) and Hydrologiska Byråns Vattenbalansavdelning (HBV)] have been set up based on six subcatchments of Sweden. The scenario derived from CoupModel shows that the trend of ET is affected by the change of land-use, where soil evaporation tends to shift to transpiration and interception evaporation. However, HBV model produces the other scenario: the trend of ET is merely the consequence of meteorological factors. Increased ET is contributed by increased interception evaporation due to the increased precipitation.
After identifying the time split of changing ET trends, a dynamic simulation constructed both from HBV and CoupModel indicate that the increased total ET is primarily from increased ET in winter time. More and more interceptive water loss and transpiration resulted from land-use change due to more vegetation. On the other hand, land-use change is also a feed back to climate change. Transpiration controlled by the mechanism of stomata and water uptake controlled by reduction of soil moisture is highly related to variations of climatic conditions.
Source: KTH
Author: Zhang, Wenxin