Simulation of Heat and Water Transport on Different Tree Canopies: A Finite Element Approach

Carlos E. Villarreal-Olavarrieta, Néstor García-Chan and Miguel E. Vázquez-Méndez
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Carlos E. Villarreal-Olavarrieta: Departmento de Oceanografía Física, Centro de Investigación Científica y de Educación Superior de Ensenada, Ensenada 22860, Mexico
Néstor García-Chan: Departamento de Física, CU de Cs Exactas e Ingeniería, Universidad de Guadalajara, Guadalajara 44430, Mexico
Miguel E. Vázquez-Méndez: Departamento de Matemática Aplicada, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, EPSE, 27002 Lugo, Spain

Mathematics, 2021, vol. 9, issue 19, 1-20

Abstract: Heat and water transport modeling is a widely explored topic in micro-meteorology, agriculture, and forestry. One of the most popular models is the Simultaneous Heat and Water (SHAW) model, which includes partial differential equations (PDEs) for air-soil temperature and humidity, but with a priori discretized PDE for the foliage temperature in each canopy layer; it is solved using the finite difference method and the canopy shape is defined as a simple rule of proportionality of total quantities such as the total leaf area index. This work proposes a novel canopy shape characterization based on Weibull distribution, providing a continuous vertical shape function capable of fitting any tree species. This allows formulating a fully continuous SHAW-derived model, which is numerically solved by a finite element approach of P 1 Lagrange type. For this novel approach, several numerical experiments were carried out to understand how the shape of well distinguishable canopies influences heat and water transport.

Keywords: tree canopy; finite element method; Weibull distribution; SHAW model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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