Evaluation of flash drought under the impact of heat wave events in southwestern Germany

Flash droughts are a recently recognised type of extreme drought defined by the rapid onset and strong intensification of drought conditions. Our understanding of flash drought processes under the influence of heat waves needs to be improved in the context of global warming. Here, we applied a physically based hydrological model, i.e., TRAnspiration and INterception (TRAIN) model to simulate root zone soil moisture (RZSM) and evapotranspiration (ET) with daily time steps and at a 1 × 1 km resolution to identify and assess flash droughts. Two states, Baden-Württemberg (BW) and Rhineland-Palatinate (RP), located in southwestern Germany, were selected as the study areas. Three datasets, the Global Land Evaporation Amsterdam Model (GLEAM) dataset, ERA5-Land (land component of the fifth generation of European ReAnalysis) dataset, and SMAP-L4 (Soil Moisture Active Passive Level-4) dataset, were selected to evaluate the TRAIN simulated RZSM and ET from 1961 to 2016. The results show that the simulated RZSM had the highest correlation with the ERA5-Land products, followed by SMAP-L4 and GLEAM, with regional average correlation coefficients (CC) of 0.765, 0.762, and 0.746, respectively. The CC of the TRAIN simulated ET with ERA5-Land and GLEAM ET were 0.828 and 0.803, respectively. The results of the trend analyses showed a significant increase (p < 0.05) in the number of flash droughts and heat waves in both the BW and RP states. A comparative analysis revealed that the mean duration and onset speed of flash droughts in BW (RP) without heat waves were 10.42 (10.67) pentads and 19.69th percentile/pentad (17.16th percentile/pentad), respectively, while associated with heat waves they were 8.95 (9.53) pentads and 21.77th percentile/pentad (19.91th percentile/pentad), respectively. This indicates that flash droughts under the influence of heat waves are generally shorter in duration but faster in occurrence. The findings of this study have important implications for flash drought assessment, monitoring, and mitigation under the impact of heat waves.

Predicting root zone soil moisture using observations at 2121 sites across China

Root zone soil moisture (RZSM) is particularly useful for understanding hydrological processes, plant-land-atmosphere exchanges, and agriculture- and climate-related research. This study aims to estimate RZSM across China by using a one-parameter (T) exponential filter method (EF method) together with a random forest (RF) regionalization approach and by using a large dataset containing in situ observations collected at 2121 sites across China. First, at each site, T is optimized at each of four soil layers (10-20 cm, 20-30 cm, 30-40 cm and 40-50 cm) by using 0-10-cm soil layer observations and the corresponding calibration layers. Second, an RF classifier is built for each layer according to the calibrated T values and 14 soil, climate and vegetation parameters across 2121 sites. Third, the calibrated T at each soil layer is regionalized with an established RF classifier. Spatial T maps are given for each soil layer across China. Our results show that the EF method performs reasonably well in predicting RZSM at the 10-20-cm, 20-30-cm, 30-40-cm and 40-50-cm layers, with Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE) medians of 0.73, 0.52, 0.38 and 0.27, respectively, between the observations and estimations. The T parameter shows a spatial pattern in each soil layer and is largely controlled by climate regimes. This study offers an improved RZSM estimation method using a large dataset containing in situ observations; the proposed method also has the potential to be used in other parts of the world.

Global relationships among traditional reflectance vegetation indices (NDVI and NDII), evapotranspiration (ET), and soil moisture variability on weekly timescales

Monitoring the effects of water availability on vegetation globally using satellites is important for applications such as drought early warning, precision agriculture, and food security as well as for more broadly understanding relationships between water and carbon cycles. In this global study, we examine how quickly several satellite-based indicators, assumed to have relationships with water availability, respond, on timescales of days to weeks, in comparison with variations in root-zone soil moisture (RZM) that extends to about 1 m depth. The satellite indicators considered are the normalized difference vegetation and infrared indices (NDVI and NDII, respectively) derived from reflectances obtained with moderately wide (20-40 nm) spectral bands in the visible and near-infrared (NIR) and evapotranspiration (ET) estimated from thermal infrared observations and normalized by a reference ET. NDVI is primarily sensitive to chlorophyll contributions and vegetation structure while NDII may contain additional information on water content in leaves and canopy. ET includes both the loss of root zone soil water through transpiration (modulated by stomatal conductance) as well as evaporation from bare soil. We find that variations of these satellite-based drought indicators on time scales of days to weeks have significant correlations with those of RZM in the same water-limited geographical locations that are dominated by grasslands, shrublands, and savannas whose root systems are generally contained within the 1 m RZM layer. Normalized ET interannual variations show generally a faster response to water deficits and enhancements as compared with those of NDVI and NDII, particularly in sparsely vegetated regions.