Spatial Patterns in Actual Evapotranspiration Climatologies for Europe

Spatial patterns in long-term average evapotranspiration (ET) represent a unique source of information for evaluating the spatial pattern performance distributed hydrological models on river basin to continental scale. This kind model evaluation is getting increased attention, acknowledging shortcomings traditional aggregated or timeseries-based evaluations. A variety satellite remote sensing (RS)-based ET estimates exist, covering range methods and resolutions. There is, therefore, need evaluate these estimates, not only terms temporal similarity, but also patterns. The current study evaluates four RS-ET at moderate resolution with respect comparison two alternative continental-scale gridded (water-balance Budyko). To increase comparability, an empirical correction factor between clear sky all-weather ET, based eddy covariance data, derived, which could be suitable simple corrections estimates. Three (MODIS16, TSEB PT-JPL) Budyko method generally display similar both across European domain (mean SPAEF = 0.41, 0.25–0.61) within basins 0.19–0.38), although similarity varies significantly basins. In contrast, WB-ET PML_V2 produced very different ranging over combinations water, energy, vegetation land surface temperature constraints suggests that robust can achieved by combining several methods.