Evapotranspiration monitoring

On the 10th of August, Robin Voland, Blaise Porret and Tanguy Racine installed a LiCOR Water Node in the middle of the Tsanfleuron catchment. Blaise started a MSc project on Evapotranspiration at the site of Tsanfleuron. The sensor integrates measurements of air temperature, soil moisture and temperature, relative humidity, and crucially, vertical wind velocity at high frequency. This will allow actual evapotranspiration to be measured at the site during the summer, as well as from the start of the spring snow melt onwards.

The IoE module (internet of the environment), is equipped with a datalogger and a transmitter, allowing the various signals to be uploaded to the cloud, and visualised as a dashboard for key instrument diagnostics, like mast tist, or solar cell voltage.

The flux tower setup in summer, during installation

In October, as the first solid precipitations were forecast, we put the sensor in the winter mode: mast retracted, solar panel removed and stowed away safely. We also used the opportunity to make a photogrammetric model of the area surrounding the sensor, in order to calculate its footprint. Using the diffential GPS, we also recorded the precise coordinates of the sensor, so that we may find it again in spring, under several metres of snow.

The reduced winter set up (soil moisture probe only)

From Sea to Summit is jointly funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and the Croatian Science Foundation (HRZZ).