Spatiotemporal sensitivity of thermal stress for monitoring canopy hydrological stress in near real-time

Monitoring drought in real-time using minimal field data is a challenge for ecosystem management and conservation. Most methods require extensive data collection and in-situ calibration and accuracy is difficult to evaluate. Here, we demonstrated how the space-borne canopy “thermal stress”, defined as surface-air temperature difference, provides a reliable surrogate for drought-induced water stress in vegetation. Using physics-based relationships that accommodate uncertainties, we showed how changes in canopy water flux from ground-based measurements relate to both the surface energy balance and remotely-sensed thermal stress. Field measurements of evapotranspiration in the southeastern and northwestern US verify this approach based on sensitivity of evapotranspiration to thermal stress in a large range of atmospheric and climate conditions. We found that a 1 °C change in the thermal stress is comparable to 1–1.2 mm day−1 of evapotranspiration, depending on site and climate conditions. We quantified temporal and spatial sensitivity of evapotranspiration to the thermal stress and showed that it has the strongest relationship with evapotranspiration during warm and dry seasons, when monitoring drought is essential. Using only air and surface temperatures, we predicted the inter-annual anomaly in thermal stress across the contiguous United States over the course of 15 years and compared it with conventional drought indices. Among drought metrics that were considered in this study, the thermal stress had the highest correlation values. Our sensitivity results demonstrated that the thermal stress is a particularly strong indicator of water-use in warm seasons and regions. This simple metric can be used at varying time-scales to monitor surface evapotranspiration and drought in large spatial extents in near real-time.