Atmospheric Factors Affecting Global Solar and Photosynthetically Active Radiation Relationship in a Mediterranean Forest Site

Abstract

Light availability and its composition in components affecting plant growth as photosynthetically active radiation (PAR), are of critical importance in agricultural and environmental research. In this work, radiation data for the period 2009–2014 in a forest site in Greece were analyzed to identify the effect of meteorological variables on the formation of the photosynthetically active to global solar radiation ratio. The temporal changes of the ratio are also discussed. Results showed that the ratio values are higher in summer (0.462) and lower in autumn (0.432), resulting in an annual average of 0.446. In addition, for the investigated site, which was characterized by relatively high water content in the atmosphere, the atmospheric water content and clearness were found to be the most influential factors in the composition of the global solar radiation in the wavelengths of PAR. On the contrary, temperature and related meteorological attributes (including relative humidity, vapor pressure deficit and saturation vapor pressure) were found to have minor effect.

Keywords

• global solar radiation
• photosynthetically active radiation
• radiation ratio
• forest
• atmospheric clearness
• vapor