T. Weidinger et al., Effects of uncertainties in universal functions, roughness length, and displacement height on the calculation of surface layer fluxes, METEOROL Z, 9(3), 2000, pp. 139-154
A sensitivity analysis of the turbulent momentum and sensible heat fluxes a
s functions of wind speed and temperature gradients in the surface layer wa
s made on the basis of Monin-Obukhov similarity theory. The sensitivity of
parameterized fluxes to the choice of a number of universal functions found
in the Literature was examined. The relative standard deviations of sensib
le heat fluxes calculated using these universal functions are in the range
of 10 to 20%. Differences between the minimum and maximum Values of the hea
t fluxes generally are 30 to 50% of the mean values. Smaller differences ar
e found in the calculation of momentum fluxes. These results demonstrate th
e difficulty in defining an optimal universal function that would be applic
able to all conditions. The uncertainties originating from the choice of wi
nd and temperature roughness lengths and displacement height were also anal
yzed. These uncertainties are very important when a complex surface is char
acterized by single values of roughness length and displacement height. Amo
ng the surface parameters, the largest error is caused by the uncertainty i
n estimating the wind and temperature roughness lengths. In the parameteriz
ation of the surface layer, the most frequently used model (that of BUSINGE
R et al., 1971) gives roughly the same result for the turbulent diffusion c
oefficient for sensible heat and the sensible heat flux as the mean of all
the universal functions considered. However, the turbulent diffusion coeffi
cient for the momentum and the momentum flux calculated using the BUSINGER
et al. (1971) function gives substantially lower values than the average of
the universal functions considered.