Bare soil evaporation under high evaporation demand: a proposed modification to the FAO-56 model

This study evaluates the evaporation component of the FAO-56 model under high evaporation demand. To perform this, two data sets were used as field evaluation, and a second model was used for comparison (a model based on the square root of time, SRT). The results show that although FAO-56, the field data and the SRT model present similar cumulative evaporation over the study period (approximately one month), when the data are analysed daily, FAO-56 overestimated evaporation at the beginning of the process and underestimated it at the end. A correction for FAO-56 is proposed to amend the mismatch between FAO-56 and the field-measured data under high evaporation conditions. Consequently, the parameters used by the FAO-56 evaporation component are discussed. Citation Torres, E. A. & Calera, A. (2010) Bare soil evaporation under high evaporation demand: a proposed modification to the FAO-56 model. Hydrol. Sci. J. 55(3), 303–315.