---
OA_place: publisher
OA_type: hybrid
_id: '22505'
abstract:
- lang: eng
text: High Mountain Asia (HMA) is among the most vulnerable water towers globally
and yet future projections of water availability in and from its high-mountain
catchments remain uncertain, as their hydrologic response to ongoing environmental
changes is complex. Mechanistic modeling approaches incorporating cryospheric,
hydrological, and vegetation processes in high spatial, temporal, and physical
detail have never been applied for high-elevation catchments of HMA. We use a
land surface model at high spatial and temporal resolution (100 m and hourly)
to simulate the coupled dynamics of energy, water, and vegetation for the 350
km2 Langtang catchment (Nepal). We compare our model outputs for one hydrological
year against a large set of observations to gain insight into the partitioning
of the water balance at the subseasonal scale and across elevation bands. During
the simulated hydrological year, we find that evapotranspiration is a key component
of the total water balance, as it causes about the equivalent of 20% of all the
available precipitation or 154% of the water production from glacier melt in the
basin to return directly to the atmosphere. The depletion of the cryospheric water
budget is dominated by snow melt, but at high elevations is primarily dictated
by snow and ice sublimation. Snow sublimation is the dominant vapor flux (49%)
at the catchment scale, accounting for the equivalent of 11% of snowfall, 17%
of snowmelt, and 75% of ice melt, respectively. We conclude that simulations should
consider sublimation and other evaporative fluxes explicitly, as otherwise water
balance estimates can be ill-quantified.
article_number: e2022WR033841
article_processing_charge: No
article_type: original
author:
- first_name: Pascal
full_name: Buri, Pascal
last_name: Buri
- first_name: Simone
full_name: Fatichi, Simone
id: cf8e546b-a9b0-11f0-a43b-aa89ed1b56d6
last_name: Fatichi
- first_name: Thomas E.
full_name: Shaw, Thomas E.
last_name: Shaw
- first_name: Evan S.
full_name: Miles, Evan S.
last_name: Miles
- first_name: Michael J.
full_name: McCarthy, Michael J.
last_name: McCarthy
- first_name: Catriona L.
full_name: Fyffe, Catriona L.
last_name: Fyffe
- first_name: Stefan
full_name: Fugger, Stefan
last_name: Fugger
- first_name: Shaoting
full_name: Ren, Shaoting
last_name: Ren
- first_name: Marin
full_name: Kneib, Marin
last_name: Kneib
- first_name: Achille
full_name: Jouberton, Achille
last_name: Jouberton
- first_name: Jakob
full_name: Steiner, Jakob
last_name: Steiner
- first_name: Koji
full_name: Fujita, Koji
last_name: Fujita
- first_name: Francesca
full_name: Pellicciotti, Francesca
last_name: Pellicciotti
citation:
ama: 'Buri P, Fatichi S, Shaw TE, et al. Land surface modeling in the himalayas:
on the importance of evaporative fluxes for the water balance of a high‐elevation
catchment. Water Resources Research. 2023;59(10). doi:10.1029/2022wr033841'
apa: 'Buri, P., Fatichi, S., Shaw, T. E., Miles, E. S., McCarthy, M. J., Fyffe,
C. L., … Pellicciotti, F. (2023). Land surface modeling in the himalayas: on the
importance of evaporative fluxes for the water balance of a high‐elevation catchment.
Water Resources Research. American Geophysical Union. https://doi.org/10.1029/2022wr033841'
chicago: 'Buri, Pascal, Simone Fatichi, Thomas E. Shaw, Evan S. Miles, Michael J.
McCarthy, Catriona L. Fyffe, Stefan Fugger, et al. “Land Surface Modeling in the
Himalayas: On the Importance of Evaporative Fluxes for the Water Balance of a
High‐elevation Catchment.” Water Resources Research. American Geophysical
Union, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1029/2022wr033841.'
ieee: 'P. Buri et al., “Land surface modeling in the himalayas: on the importance
of evaporative fluxes for the water balance of a high‐elevation catchment,” Water
Resources Research, vol. 59, no. 10. American Geophysical Union, 2023.'
ista: 'Buri P, Fatichi S, Shaw TE, Miles ES, McCarthy MJ, Fyffe CL, Fugger S, Ren
S, Kneib M, Jouberton A, Steiner J, Fujita K, Pellicciotti F. 2023. Land surface
modeling in the himalayas: on the importance of evaporative fluxes for the water
balance of a high‐elevation catchment. Water Resources Research. 59(10), e2022WR033841.'
mla: 'Buri, Pascal, et al. “Land Surface Modeling in the Himalayas: On the Importance
of Evaporative Fluxes for the Water Balance of a High‐elevation Catchment.” Water
Resources Research, vol. 59, no. 10, e2022WR033841, American Geophysical Union,
2023, doi:10.1029/2022wr033841.'
short: P. Buri, S. Fatichi, T.E. Shaw, E.S. Miles, M.J. McCarthy, C.L. Fyffe, S.
Fugger, S. Ren, M. Kneib, A. Jouberton, J. Steiner, K. Fujita, F. Pellicciotti,
Water Resources Research 59 (2023).
das_tickbox: '1'
date_created: 2026-07-27T12:30:24Z
date_published: 2023-10-01T00:00:00Z
date_updated: 2026-08-11T05:45:52Z
day: '01'
doi: 10.1029/2022wr033841
extern: '1'
intvolume: ' 59'
issue: '10'
language:
- iso: eng
main_file_link:
- open_access: '1'
url: https://doi.org/10.1029/2022WR033841
month: '10'
oa: 1
oa_version: Published Version
publication: Water Resources Research
publication_identifier:
eissn:
- 1944-7973
issn:
- 0043-1397
publication_status: published
publisher: American Geophysical Union
quality_controlled: '1'
scopus_import: '1'
status: public
title: 'Land surface modeling in the himalayas: on the importance of evaporative fluxes
for the water balance of a high‐elevation catchment'
tmp:
image: /images/cc_by_nc_nd.png
legal_code_url: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode
name: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
(CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
short: CC BY-NC-ND (4.0)
type: journal_article
user_id: ba8df636-2132-11f1-aed0-ed93e2281fdd
volume: 59
year: '2023'
...