Estimation of Arecanut Crop Evapotranspiration Rate using Remote Sensing

Abstract

Arecanut is a plantation crop sustains for decades and its crop water demand varies with the age. For scheduling and management of irrigation water, crop water requirement information is important. To calculate the crop water requirement, estimation of evapotranspiration is crucial. The term Evapotranspiration (ET) refers to transport of water molecules into the atmosphere from soil (soil evaporation) and vegetation (transpiration) surfaces. It is a most important component of hydrological cycle and also the most difficult factor to quantify. Crop water need is the amount of water required for balancing loss due to evapotranspiration. There are different methods proposed by researchers for the estimation of evapotranspiration. The conventional methods of evapotranspiration estimation from ground data are tedious. The advancement in remote sensing data provides estimation of evapotranspiration in a global scale. The invention of thermal remote sensing has benefitted greatly since it reduces the field data requirement for estimation of ET. It also helps to understand spatial distribution of landmass and different estimates also in estimation of evapotranspiration over a larger extent timely and periodically. In this study to estimate Arecanut crop evapotranspiration Hargreaves Samani, Penman Monteith and Priestly Taylor methods were used and compared. Arecanut crop evapotranspiration rate estimated form Landsat 8 and MODIS data are showed similar range of values between 3 to 4.45 mm/day. The study area covers an area of 835.3 hectares of Arecanut crop and the gross crop water need is found to be 23059 m 3 .