Estimation of potential evapotranspiration using INSAT-3D satellite data over an agriculture area

Rapidly changes in potential evapotranspiration can provide significant information in understanding of hydrologic processes as well as for agricultural crop performance. Such information can also prove to be useful in climate related studies. However, accurate measurements and predictions of evapotranspiration are difficult especially at large spatial scales. Remote sensing provides a cost‐effective approach to determine potential evapotranspiration at both regional and global scales. In the present study, effectiveness of Hamon’s method for measuring annual variations in potential evapotranspiration based using INSAT-3D dataset was evaluated for agricultural area of Varanasi region, India. Observed potential evapotranspiration data was compared with INSAT-3D satellite data. The performances indices such as correlation (r), Bias and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) indicate the values of 0.572, 0.524 and 0.834 for INSAT-3D data. Result indicated that INSAT-3D data further can be used for estimation of evapotranspiration.