Energy and water cycle over the Tibetan plateau : surface energy balance and turbulent heat fluxes

Abstract

This contribution presents an overview and an outlook of studies on energy and water cycle over the Tibetan plateau with focuses on the estimation of energy balance terms and turbulent heat fluxes. On the basis of the surface energy balance calculations, we show that the phenomena of the energy imbalance exist in GAME/Tibet experiment data, although the explanations for the reasons are debated now and not resolved yet. We found that the derived latent heat flux is much higher than the measurements. However, the corrected-measurements, which are calculated according to the hypothesis of the energy balance, compare very well with the estimation of SEBS. On this basis it is concluded that the deviation is caused by the energy imbalance of ground measurements in GAME/Tibet experiment area. The latent heat fluxes were likely under-observed.