Surface Energy Budget Over a Land Surface in the Tropics

Atmospheric convection is sensitive to the nature of the surface and its temperature. Both dry (without cloud) and moist (with cloud) convection depend on the surface temperature. Surface temperature is of critical importance in several practical applications like human comfort and crop cultivation. In the climate change scenario too, variations in the surface temperature take the center stage. Therefore, prediction of surface temperature is important. The evolution of the temperature is governed by the energy equation and the surface temperature by the surface energy balance. Important components of the surface energy balance are radiation (incoming solar radiation, reflected solar radiation, incoming and outgoing longwave radiation), sensible and latent heat fluxes and heat flux into the ground (called ground heat flux).The present study addressed the above problem by using the data from a 10 m meteorological tower. Turbulent fluxes were computed using both profile and Eddy Correlation Method (ECM) and sensitivity of the fluxes for small calibration errors is evaluated and quantified the minimum data accuracies for flux measurement with the Profile method (PM).