Estimation of crop water use using an integrated approach of remote sensing and crop models is a novel use of technology. In this approach, crop water use is estimated as a product of potential evapotranspiration (PET) and a spectral crop coefficient (Ksp) evaluated from crop ground cover. Ground cover can be easily determined from remote sensing observations in the red and near-infrared wavelengths, such as from Landsat imagery. This technique was used to estimate crop water use for 26 agricultural fields in the region southeast of
Plainview,
Texas. These results were compared with actual measurements of evapotranspiration obtained using two mobile eddy covariance systems deployed at these test fields