Evapotranspiration and Turbulent Fluxes

EvapotranspirationReference EvapotranspirationLatent and Sensible Heat Flux

Evapotranspiration (ET)

Evapotranspiration (ET) accounts for the flux of water evaporated at the Earth-atmosphere interface (soil + vegetation + water bodies) and transpired by vegetation through stomata in its leaves as a consequence of photosynthetic processes. Evapotranspiration plays a crucial role in the recycling of precipitation, in soil water availability and consequently on food production. Evapotranspiration is dependent mainly on the solar energy available to vaporize the water and in water content in the soil layers. Because of the dependence on solar energy, ET varies with latitude, season of year, time of day, and cloud cover.

Available Products:

  • MET: instantaneous ET estimates derived using observations performed by SEVIRI/MSG
  • DMET: daily integration of MET;

The use of LSA SAF products in publications is kindly requested to be duly acknowledged:

[product] was provided by the EUMETSAT Satellite Application Facility on Land Surface Analysis (LSA SAF; Trigo et al., 2011)
http://lsa-saf.eumetsat.int

Trigo, I. F., C. C. DaCamara, P. Viterbo, J.-L. Roujean, F. Olesen, C. Barroso, F. Camacho-de Coca, D. Carrer, S. C. Freitas, J. García-Haro, B. Geiger, F. Gellens-Meulenberghs, N. Ghilain, J. Meliá, L. Pessanha, N. Siljamo, and A. Arboleda, 2011: The Satellite Application Facility on Land Surface Analysis. Int. J. Remote Sens., 32, 2725-2744, doi: 10.1080/01431161003743199

Product specific citations:

  • ETv3 (LSA-311.3, LSA-350), DMETv3 (LSA-312.3, LSA-351), MLEv3 (LSA-305-3, LSA-353), MHv3 (LSA-304.3, LSA-352):

Barrios, J.M., Arboleda, A., Dutra, E., Trigo, I. & Gellens-Meulenberghs, F. (2024) Evapotranspiration and surface energy fluxes across Europe, Africa and Eastern South America throughout the operational life of the Meteosat second generation satellite. Geoscience Data Journal, 11, 589–607. Available from:https://doi.org/10.1002/gdj3.235

  • MET/DMET [LSA-311; LSA-312]:

Ghilain, N., Arboleda, A. and Gellens-Meulenberghs F., 2011: Evapotranspiration modelling at large scale using near-real time MSG SEVIRI derived data. Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., doi:10.5194/hess-15-771-2011, 15, 771–786.

Ghilain, N., Arboleda, A., Sepulcre-Cantò, G., Batelaan, O., Ardö, J. and Gellens-Meulenberghs, F., 2012: Improving evapotranspiration in land surface models by using biophysical variables derived from MSG/SEVIRI satellite. Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., doi:10.5194/hess-16-2567-2012, 15, 2567-2583.

Available data formats:

  • Geostationary/sinusoidal grid in HDF5
  • Regular grid in NETCDF4

Data Server information:

ProductSensor/
Platform		Spatial
coverage		Spatial
resolution		Temporal
Coverage		Temporal
resolution		DocumentationData access
LSASAF_MSG_ET_MSG-Disk.png

MSG ET v3
METv3 [LSA-311.3]
Data Record
METv3-R [LSA-350]
Operational

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o		2004-NRT30 minAccess HereMSG/METv3
LSASAF_MSG_DMET_MSG-Disk.png

MSG Daily ET v3
DMETv3 [LSA-312.3]
Data Record
DMETv3-R [LSA-351]
Operational

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o		2004-NRTdailyMSG/MDMETv3
LSASAF_MSG_ET_MSG-Disk.png

MSG ET
MET [LSA-311]
Operational
QuickLook

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o

2019-NRT

30 min

Access Here

MSG/MET
LSASAF_MSG_DMET_MSG-Disk.png

MSG Daily ET
DMET [LSA-312]
Operational
QuickLook

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o		2015-NRTdailyAccess HereMSG/MDMET

Reference Evapotranspiration (ETo)

Reference evapotranspiration (ETo) is the evapotranspiration rate from a clearly defined reference surface. The concept was introduced to allow the estimation of the evaporative demand of the atmosphere independently of crop type, crop development or management practices. ETo corresponds to the evapotranspiration from a hypothetical extensive well-watered field covered with 12 cm height green grass having an albedo of 0.23 would experience under the given down-welling short-wave radiation.

Available Products:

  • METREF: daily ETo derived from observations performed by SEVIRI/MSG; demonstration product available for the Indian Ocean Data Coverage (IODC)

The use of LSA SAF products in publications is kindly requested to be duly acknowledged:

[product] was provided by the EUMETSAT Satellite Application Facility on Land Surface Analysis (LSA SAF; Trigo et al., 2011)
http://lsa-saf.eumetsat.int

Trigo, I. F., C. C. DaCamara, P. Viterbo, J.-L. Roujean, F. Olesen, C. Barroso, F. Camacho-de Coca, D. Carrer, S. C. Freitas, J. García-Haro, B. Geiger, F. Gellens-Meulenberghs, N. Ghilain, J. Meliá, L. Pessanha, N. Siljamo, and A. Arboleda, 2011: The Satellite Application Facility on Land Surface Analysis. Int. J. Remote Sens., 32, 2725-2744, doi: 10.1080/01431161003743199

  • METREF (LSA-303)

Trigo, I. F., de Bruin, H., Beyrich, F., Bosveld, F. C., Gavilán, P., Groh, J., & López-Urrea, R. (2018). Validation of reference evapotranspiration from Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) observations. In Agricultural and Forest Meteorology (Vol. 259, pp. 271–285). Elsevier BV. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2018.05.008

Available data formats:

  • Geostationary/sinusoidal grid in HDF5
  • Regular grid in NETCDF4

Data Server information:

ProductSensor/
Platform		Spatial
coverage		Spatial
resolution		Temporal
Coverage		Temporal
resolution		DocumentationData access
LSASAF_MSG_METREF_MSG-Disk.png

MSG ET Ref
METREF [LSA-303]
Operational
QuickLook

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o

2004-NRT

dailyAccess HereMSG/METREF
LSASAF_MSG_METREF_IODC-Disk.png

MSG-IODC
ET Ref
METREF
Demonstration

SEVIRI/
MSG
Europe, Africa,
Middle East		3 km
0.05ox0.05o		2017-NRTdailyAccess HereMSG-IODC/METREF

Latent and Sensible Heat Flux (LE/H)

Sensible (H) and Latent heat flux (LE) account for the fluxes of energy associated to the exchange of heat by convection (for H) and to the exchange of water vapour (for LE) at the Earth-atmosphere interface (soil + vegetation + water bodies). Accurate measurements of surface heat fluxes at large spatial scales are central to understand land and atmosphere interactions in the context of global warming. They are of great importance in disciplines like weather forecasting, water management, agriculture, hydrology, ecology and global climate monitoring.

Available Products:

  • MLE: instantaneous LE derived using observations performed by SEVIRI/MSG;
  • MH: instantaneous H derived using observations performed by SEVIRI/MSG;

The use of LSA SAF products in publications is kindly requested to be duly acknowledged:

[product] was provided by the EUMETSAT Satellite Application Facility on Land Surface Analysis (LSA SAF; Trigo et al., 2011)
http://lsa-saf.eumetsat.int

Trigo, I. F., C. C. DaCamara, P. Viterbo, J.-L. Roujean, F. Olesen, C. Barroso, F. Camacho-de Coca, D. Carrer, S. C. Freitas, J. García-Haro, B. Geiger, F. Gellens-Meulenberghs, N. Ghilain, J. Meliá, L. Pessanha, N. Siljamo, and A. Arboleda, 2011: The Satellite Application Facility on Land Surface Analysis. Int. J. Remote Sens., 32, 2725-2744, doi: 10.1080/01431161003743199

Product specific citations:

  • ETv3 (LSA-311.3, LSA-350), DMETv3 (LSA-312.3, LSA-351), MLEv3 (LSA-305-3, LSA-353), MHv3 (LSA-304.3, LSA-352):

Barrios, J.M., Arboleda, A., Dutra, E., Trigo, I. & Gellens-Meulenberghs, F. (2024) Evapotranspiration and surface energy fluxes across Europe, Africa and Eastern South America throughout the operational life of the Meteosat second generation satellite. Geoscience Data Journal, 11, 589–607. Available from:https://doi.org/10.1002/gdj3.235

  • MLE/MH [LSA-305; LSA-304]:

Ghilain, N., Arboleda, A. and Gellens-Meulenberghs F., 2011: Evapotranspiration modelling at large scale using near-real time MSG SEVIRI derived data. Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., doi:10.5194/hess-15-771-2011, 15, 771–786.

Ghilain, N., Arboleda, A., Sepulcre-Cantò, G., Batelaan, O., Ardö, J. and Gellens-Meulenberghs, F., 2012: Improving evapotranspiration in land surface models by using biophysical variables derived from MSG/SEVIRI satellite. Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., doi:10.5194/hess-16-2567-2012, 15, 2567-2583.

Available data formats:

  • Geostationary/sinusoidal grid in HDF5
  • Regular grid in NETCDF4

Data Server information:

ProductSensor/
Platform		Spatial
coverage		Spatial
resolution		Temporal
Coverage		Temporal
resolution		DocumentationData access
LSASAF_MSG_MLE_MSG-Disk.png

MSG LE v3
MLEv3 [LSA-305.3]
Data Record
MLEv3-R [LSA-353]
Operational

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o		2021-NRT30 minAccess HereMSG/MLEv3
LSASAF_MSG_MH_MSG-Disk.png

MSG H v3
MHv3 [LSA-304.3]
Data Record
MHv3-R [LSA-352]
Operational

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o		2004-NRT30 minMSG/MHv3
LSASAF_MSG_MLE_MSG-Disk.png

MSG LE
MLE [LSA-305]
Operational
QuickLook

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o

2019-NRT

30 min

Access Here

MSG/MLE
LSASAF_MSG_MH_MSG-Disk.png

MSG H
MH [LSA-304]
Operational
QuickLook

SEVIRI/
MSG		Europe, Africa,
South America		3 km
0.05ox0.05o		2019-NRT30 minMSG/MH