Characterizing evapotranspiration over a meadow ecosystem on the Qinghai‐Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

To characterize evapotranspiration (ET) over grasslands on the Qinghai‐Tibetan Plateau, we examined ET and its relevant environmental variables in a Kobresia meadow from 2002 to 2004 using the eddy covariance method. The annual precipitation changed greatly, with 554, 706, and 666 mm a−1 for the three consecutive calendar years. The annual ET varied correspondingly to the annual precipitation with 341, 407, and 426 mm a−1. The annual ET was, however, constant at about 60% of the annual precipitation. About 85% annual ET occurred during the growing season from May to September, and the averaged ET for this period was 1.90, 2.23, and 2.22 mm/d, respectively for the three consecutive years. The averaged ET was, however, very low (<0.40 mm/d) during the nongrowing season from October to April. The annual canopy conductance (gc) and the Priestley‐Taylor coefficient (α) showed the lowest values in the year with the lowest precipitation. This study first demonstrates that the alpine meadow ecosystem is characterized by a low ratio of annual ET to precipitation and that the interannual variation of ET is determined by annual precipitation.