Exploring the use of displaced beam scintillometer for daytime measurement of surface energy fluxes over a Mediterranean Olive Orchard

Studies have shown that the footprint of a single eddy covariance (EC) system may not yield representative measurements of the turbulent fluxes at the field scale for sparse vegetated surfaces, whereas scintillometry, due to its larger footprint, may be more suitable for this purpose. However, the latter approach strongly relies on the Monin-Obukov similarity theory (MOST) that strictly applies in the inertial sub-layer only. This work aims at experimentally confirm the reliability of displaced-beam laser scintillometers (DBLS) measurements over an olive orchard against two EC systems during summer and autumn months of 2007 through 2009. It was found that the DBLS underestimated both the mo…