002 PDF

Produced by: Natural Resources
Management and Environment

Department
Title: Crop evapotranspiration - Guidelines for computing crop water
requirements...
Preface
This publication presents an updated procedure for calculating reference and crop
evapotranspiration from meteorological data and crop coefficients. The procedure, first
presented in the FAO Irrigation and Drainage Paper No. 24 'Crop Water Requirements',
is termed the 'Kc ETo' approach, whereby the effect of the climate on crop water
requirements is given by the reference evapotranspiration ETo and the effect of the crop
by the crop coefficient Kc. Other procedures developed in FAO Irrigation and Drainage
Paper No. 24 such as the estimation of dependable and effective rainfall, the calculation
of irrigation requirements and the design of irrigation schedules are not presented in this
publication but will be the subject of later papers in the series.
Since the publication of FAO Irrigation and Drainage Paper No. 24 in 1977, advances in
research and more accurate assessment of crop water use have revealed the need to
update the FAO methodologies for calculating ETo. The FAO Penman method was
found to frequently overestimate ETo while the other FAO recommended equations,
namely the radiation, the Blaney-Criddle, and the pan evaporation methods, showed
variable adherence to the grass reference crop evapotranspiration.
In May 1990, FAO organized a consultation of experts and researchers in collaboration

with the International Commission for Irrigation and Drainage and with the World
Meteorological Organization, to review the FAO methodologies on crop water
requirements and to advise on the revision and update of procedures.
The panel of experts recommended the adoption of the Penman-Monteith combination

method as a new standard for reference evapotranspiration and advised on procedures
for calculating the various parameters. The FAO Penman-Monteith method was
developed by defining the reference crop as a hypothetical crop with an assumed height
of 0.12 m, with a surface resistance of 70 s m-1 and an albedo of 0.23, closely
resembling the evaporation from an extensive surface of green grass of uniform height,
actively growing and adequately watered. The method overcomes the shortcomings of
the previous FAO Penman method and provides values that are more consistent with
actual crop water use data worldwide. Furthermore, recommendations have been
developed using the FAO Penman-Monteith method with limited climatic data, thereby
largely eliminating the need for any other reference evapotranspiration methods and
creating a consistent and transparent basis for a globally valid standard for crop water
requirement calculations.
The FAO Penman-Monteith method uses standard climatic data that can be easily
measured or derived from commonly measured data. All calculation procedures have
been standardized according to the available weather data and the time scale of
computation. The calculation methods, as well as the procedures for estimating missing
climatic data, are presented in this publication.
In the 'Kc-ETo' approach, differences in the crop canopy and aerodynamic resistance
relative to the reference crop are accounted for within the crop coefficient. The Kc
coefficient serves as an aggregation of the physical and physiological differences
between crops. Two calculation methods to derive crop evapotranspiration from ETo are
presented. The first approach integrates the relationships between evapotranspiration of
the crop and the reference surface into a single Kc coefficient. In the second approach,
Kc is split into two factors that separately describe the evaporation (Ke) and transpiration
(Kcb) components. The selection of the Kc approach depends on the purpose of the
calculation and the time step on which the calculations are to be executed.
The final chapters present procedures that can be used to make adjustments to crop
coefficients to account for deviations from standard conditions, such as water and
salinity stress, low plant density, environmental factors and management practices.
Examples demonstrate the various calculation procedures throughout the publication.

Most of the computations, namely all those required for the reference evapotranspiration
and the single crop coefficient approach, can be performed using a pocket calculator,
calculation sheets and the numerous tables given in the publication. The user may also
build computer algorithms, either using a spreadsheet or any programming language.
These guidelines are intended to provide guidance to project managers, consultants,

irrigation engineers, hydrologists, agronomists, meteorologists and students for the
calculation of reference and crop evapotranspiration. They can be used for computing
crop water requirements for both. irrigated and rainfed agriculture, and for computing
water consumption by agricultural and natural vegetation.

002 PDF

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

002 PDF

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

002 PDF

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Produced by: Natural Resources

Management and Environment

In May 1990, FAO organized a consultation of experts and researchers in collaboration

The panel of experts recommended the adoption of the Penman-Monteith combination

Examples demonstrate the various calculation procedures throughout the publication.

These guidelines are intended to provide guidance to project managers, consultants,

You might also like