Model Based Study of Crop Evapotranspiration under Canopy Shading

Abstract

California has some of the key agricultural regions in the United States. One of these key regions, San Joaquin Valley, frequently experiences severe droughts leading to shortage of irrigation water. This has a significant impact on the agricultural based economy of the region. It is imperative to develop new strategies to reduce overall water consumption in agriculture without affecting crop yield. A large fraction of irrigation water is lost due to the evapotranspiration (ET) process in the crops and the soil. The classical Penman-Monteith model has been used in the present work to analyze the effect of different environmental variables and water saving strategies on the ET. Some of the scenarios considered show potential for significant water savings without much reduction in the amount of sunlight available to facilitate crop growth. The central idea considered in this study is the use of canopy shading to cover the crop field resulting in reduction in the ET. Among the strategies considered, the most promising strategy is to partially cover the crop field for a certain part of the day by employing a partially covering retractable canopy. Based on numerical calculations, total reduction in ET is calculated to be 37% from June to August for the partially covering retractable canopy.

Assessing water footprint of large cardamom and developing management strategy in Sikkim, India*

“…If concrete or any water‐holding structure were built it would be necessary to assess the environmental flow. Further, large cardamom is a shade‐loving crop and shading has an impact on ET requirements; however, productivity improves or remains unaffected (Yu et al, 2019). Further, they mentioned that appropriate partitioning of water usage due to shading will require a number of parameters related to the local climate as well as the crop; selection of an appropriate study with all the required parameters provided is critical.…”

Productivity, Morphology and Chemical Composition of Brachiaria spp. Ecotypes, under Two Solar Illumination Intensities, in Yucatan, Mexico

“…The effect of trees over microclimatic conditions and evapotranspiration has been amply studied [62][63][64][65][66]. Benegas et al [67] studied the main processes by which trees influence the soil water dynamics in a tropical grassland, with dispersed trees in Honduras.…”

“…The findings of this study provide evidence that trees can have positive effects on the local hydric balance. Because it was identified that a large fraction of the irrigation water in crops in central California was lost due to evapotranspiration, Yu et al [63] recommended the use of shade to cover field crops, which resulted in a 37% reduction in evapotranspiration during the hottest months.…”