Arid Zone Research ›› 2023, Vol. 40 ›› Issue (7): 1085-1093.doi: 10.13866/j.azr.2023.07.06

• Land and Water Resources • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Actual evapotranspiration characteristics and attribution in arid Central Asia based on the Priestley-Taylor method

ZHAO Zhuoyi1,2,3(),HAO Xingming1,3()   

  1. 1. State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Key Laboratory of Ecological Safety and Sustainable Development in Arid Lands, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830011, Xinjiang, China
    2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
    3. Akesu National Station of Observation and Research for Oasis Agro-ecosystem, Akesu 843017, Xinjiang, China
  • Received:2023-03-07 Revised:2023-03-28 Online:2023-07-15 Published:2023-08-01

Abstract:

Understanding the dynamic process of evapotranspiration and its causes is crucial for water resource stability, ecological and environmental security, and agricultural water resource management in arid Central Asia. Evapotranspiration is the connection between the water-energy-carbon cycle. This study used the Priestley-Taylor diurnal land surface temperature range (PT-DTsR) model to calculate and analyze the spatial and temporal variability of evapotranspiration in arid Central Asia from 2000 to 2019. It also used the Lindeman-Merenda-Gold method to quantitatively evaluate the absolute contributions of various drivers to each component of evapotranspiration. By weighing each component’s contribution to the change in evapotranspiration, the contribution of each driver to evapotranspiration was assessed. According to the findings, evapotranspiration increased in dry Central Asia at a rate of 1.45 mm per year, and its pattern indicates that it increased in the east and decreased in the west. The changes in transpiration, evaporation, and interception were 2.46 mm·a-1, -1.03 mm·a-1, and 0.02 mm·a-1, respectively. These three trends contributed 70.09%, 29.34%, and 0.57%, to the change in evapotranspiration. With an absolute contribution of 28.16%, Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) is the key driver of evapotranspiration fluctuations in arid Central Asia.

Key words: evapotranspiration, spatiotemporal variation, attribution, absolute contribution, Central Asia, arid zone