Spatiotemporal Variation Characteristics of Reference Evapotranspiration and Relative Moisture Index in Heilongjiang Investigated through Remote Sensing Tools

Abstract

Reference evapotranspiration (ET0) is one of the significant parameters in agricultural irrigation, especially in Heilongjiang, a big agricultural province in China. In this research, the spatiotemporal variation characteristics of evapotranspiration (ET), relative moisture index (MI) and influencing factors of ET0 in Heilongjiang, which was divided into six ecology districts according to landforms, were analyzed with meteorological data observed over 40 years from 1980 and MOD16 products from 2000 to 2017 using Morlet wavelet analysis and partial correlation analysis. The results indicated that (1) the spatial distribution of ET and PET in Heilongjiang in humid, normal and arid years showed a distribution of being higher in the southwest and lower in the northwest, and higher in the south and lower in the north. The PET was higher than ET from 2002 to 2017, and the difference was small, indicating that the overall moisture in Heilongjiang was sufficient in these years. (2) In the last 40 years, the ET0 increased while the annual MI decreased. The annual minimum of MI in the six regions of Heilongjiang was −0.25, showing that all six regions were drought free. (3) The importance of the meteorological factors affecting ET0 was ranked as average relative humidity > average wind speed > sunshine duration. This research provides scientific guidance for the study of using remote sensing to reverse ET.