Journal article
The role of topography and the north Indian monsoon on mean monthly climate interpolation within the Himalayan Kingdom of Bhutan
SB Stewart, K Choden, M Fedrigo, SH Roxburgh, RJ Keenan, CR Nitschke
International Journal of Climatology | WILEY | Published : 2017
DOI: 10.1002/joc.5045
Abstract
Spatial climate datasets currently available for Bhutan are limited by weather station data availability, spatial resolution or interpolation methodology. This article presents new datasets for monthly maximum temperature, minimum temperature, precipitation and vapour pressure climate normals interpolated for the 1986–2015 reference period using trivariate smoothing splines. The inclusion of standardized day time Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) land surface temperature (LST) values as partial spline dependencies reduced cross validated root mean square error (RMSE) for maximum temperature by up to 16.0% and was most effective between March and September. Using both a to..
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Funding Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the Department of Hydro-Met Services (DHMS), Ministry of Economic Affairs, Bhutan, for providing weather station data which made this research possible. The research was supported by the Melbourne Research Scholarship (University of Melbourne) with additional funding provided by the State of Victoria Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) though the Integrated Forest Ecosystem Research (iFER) program.