Sensible heat flux estimated from one-level air temperature near the land surface

Abstract

A new method for estimating sensible heat flux from one-level measurements of air temperature in the atmospheric surface layer is presented. An analytical solution of the heat transfer equation with a variable diffusion coefficient has been derived to express the vertical gradient of air temperature in terms of the time series of air temperature at a single height level. The case study indicates that the new method is able to give reasonable estimates of sensible heat flux using near surface air temperature measurements. Copyright 2004 by the American Geophysical Union.