Modelling energy fluxes in remote wetland ecosystems with help of remote sensing

The study of the material and energy fluxes that characterise an ecosystem is fundamental to understanding the behaviour of that system and its resiliency in the face of changing local and global conditions. In the present research, an extended energy balance model was used to examine the fluxes that characterise the energy exchange between a large wetland area and its environment. For each flux term, a number of modelling approaches was compared. Modelling was complemented through the use of irradiance measurements from satellite data. The model output shows the daily and season variations in each energy term, as well as a comparison of the modelling approaches. The final output of the model is validated with the measured hourly variation in the enthalpy (water temperature) of the lagoon. A comparison is made of the relative importance of each energy term in the overall balance of the system. This physical based model is being used to examine possible modifications of local and global environments to the wetland energy balance. The model is also being combined with fauna models to examine the relation between climate and population characteristics (habitat). The present work is directed towards the study of a subtropical lagoon in the internationally important wetland, the Esteros del Ibera in Argentina