A joint research team comprised of 23 students from the United States and Scotland will be conducting field work in the Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming during a three week stretch in the summer of 1998. The focus of the research will be the energy budget of a small high mountain cirque and how the radiation balance effects the local vegetation and hydrology of the stream system.
Measurements will be taken of the incoming and reflected solar radiation, the upward and downward infrared radiation, and the sensible heat flux in order to map the energy transfer within a high mountain cirque. In addition, meteorological measurements, such as temperature, cloud cover, precipitation, relative humidity, wind speed and direction, and air pressure will be made in an effort to understand the microclimate of the cirque.
In this presentation, we will consider the surface energy balance of the cirque, paying special attention to the balance of the radiative fluxes, how that balance is affected by clouds, and how the surface temperature responds to the radiative fluxes. The role of the surface energy budget in determining vegetative cover will also be considered.