Indian Journal of Science and Technology

Abstract

Surface energy balance studies for the humid tropical West African sub-region is rare in spite of its vital applications in agriculture, hydrological and climate modeling at local regional and global scale. In this study, the Eddy covariance technique (EC) has been used to study the partitioning of the available energy (R_N-H_G ) and energy balance closure over a humid tropical site at Ile-Ife, Nigeria (7.55^o N; 4.56^o E). The results showed that during the dry periods, the sensible heat flux was about 55–70% of the net radiation. However, for any wet day, the latent heat flux during the daytime was about 60 – 70% of the net radiation depending on the degree of the soil wetness and the prevailing atmospheric conditions. The available energy (R_N-H_G ) is larger (in most cases) than the sum of the turbulent fluxes (H_S+H_LE) with a closure of energy balance varying between 65-93 %.
Keywords: Surface energy balance; closure; eddy covariance; humid tropical; Nigeria