干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

We set up an automatic weather station over a playa (the flat floor of an undrained desert basin that becomes at times a shallow lake), approximately 65 km east-west by 130 km north-south, located at the U.S. Army Dugway Proving Ground (40degrees08’N, 113degrees27’W, 1124m above mean sea level) in north-western Utah, U.S.A., in 1999. This station measured the incoming (R-si) and outgoing (R-so) solar or shortwave radiation using two CM21 Kipp & Zonen pyranometers (one inverted), the incoming (R-li or atmospheric) and outgoing (RI, or terrestrial) longwave radiation, using two CG1 KippZonen pyrgeometers (one inverted), and the net (R-n) radiation using a Q*7 net radiometer (Radiation Energy Balance System, REBS). We also measured the 10-m wind speed (U-10) and direction (R.M. Young wind monitor) and precipitation (Campbell Sci., Inc.). The measurements were taken every 2 s, averaged into 20-min, continuously, throughout the year. The annual (August 1999 - August 2000) comparisons of global or solar radiation and windiness with two other stations in central (Hunter) and northern (Logan) Utah, indicate higher solar radiation (R-si,(Dugway) = 7797 MJ m(-2) period(-1) vs. R-si,(Hunter) = 7021 MJ m(-2) period(-1) and R-si,(Logan) = 6865 MJ m(-2) period(-1)) and much higher annual mean windiness (U-Dugway = 387 km day(-1) vS. U-Hunter = 275 km day(-1) and U-Logan =174 km day(-1)) throughout the period over the playa. These data reveal the possibility of simultaneously harvesting these two sources of clean energies at this vast and uniform playa. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd.