Evaluation of the weak constraint data assimilation approach for estimating turbulent heat fluxes at six sites

The model error term can capture errors in the turbulent heat flux estimates due to errors in LST and micrometeorological measurements, as well as structural model errors, and does not allow those errors to adversely affect the turbulent heat flux estimates. The findings also indicate that the estimated model error term varies reasonably well, so as to capture the misfit between predicted and observed net radiation in different hydrological and vegetative conditions.

Finally, synthetically generated positive (negative) noises are added to the hydrological input variables (e.g., LST, air temperature, air humidity, incoming solar radiation, and wind speed) to examine whether the WC-VDA approach can capture those errors. It was found that the WC-VDA approach accounts for the errors in the input data and reduces their effect on the turbulent heat flux estimates.