Application of the Philip and De Vries Theory of Heat and Moisture Transfer Including Extensions to Evaporation From Bare Soil.

The basic version of the Philip and de Vries theory of heat and moisture transfer in porous media was first published in 1957. In 1958 de Vries discussed straightforward extensions to the theory that take into consideration processes deemed to be less important than those presented in the 1957 theory. The physical basis of the theory has been considered sound and it has been applied in many contexts, including evaporation from soil. In many of these applications, the resolution of the numerical grid has been inadequate to demonstrate the full ramifications of the theory and effects of many of the extensions to the theory have not been systematically investigated. In this paper the Philip and de Vries theory is properly applied to evaporation from bare soil. Effects of texture and input energy are investigated and the importance of extensions to the theory added by de Vries in 1958 are evaluated systematically.