Spatio-temporal changes in evapotranspiration over China using GLEAM_V3.0a products (1980–2014)

This study used land evapotranspiration (ET) values from 61 ChinaFLUX eddy covariance (EC) sites and water-balanced derived ET in ten basins to investigate the performance of Global Land Evaporation Amsterdam Model (GLEAM) V3.0a ET estimates (i.e., ET G ) over China. We quantified the spatio-temporal characteristics of ET G and the impact of precipitation (P) and potential ET (ET P ) on ET G . ET G was appropriate for estimating daily, seasonal, and annual ET rates. The mean annual ET G increased progressively from the northwest to southeast of China. Domain-averaged annual ET G over China was 421.90 mm year −1 during 1980 to 2014. The spatial patterns of ET G were in accordance with those of annual precipitation. Low ET G values occurred in the Northwest River Basin, and relatively high ET values were found across southern China. ET G showed the highest annual variation in the Northwest River Basin and low variation in the southwest region, which captured seasonal variations with maxima in summer and minima in winter. The inter-annual variation of annual ET G and ET P differed significantly from 1980 to 2014, yielding prominent spatial variability around −16.50 to 9.10 mm year −2 and −1.90 to 4.70 mm year −2 , respectively. Annual ET G is correlated well with P and ET P at each site.