Abstract: Taking three typical maize land sites in North China (Juxian station in Shandong province, Zhengzhou and Nanyang stations in Henan province) as the research objects, the effects of radiation models on crop yield simulation were investigated. Five radiation models, including the Angstrom-Prescott (A-P) model, Ogelman model, the Bahel model, the comprehensive model of sunshine duration and diurnal temperature range model (referred to as the comprehensive model), and Liu’s model (followed by simulation scheme 1-5) , were used to simulate the total solar radiation and validated against measurement (simulation scheme 0). The radiation results of the five models were further utilized to drive APSIM model to simulate the maize yield. The results showed that the estimated errors（εi）of A-P model was the smallest in the Juxian station, and that of the comprehensive model was the smallest in Zhengzhou and Nanyang stations. Different radiation estimation models had significantly different effects on yield simulation results of APSIM model, scheme 4 rendered the best result. The radiation errors brought by the five radiation models had enlarged the final results of maize yield simulated by APSIM model. The propagation error transferred to APSIM maize model simulation yield was 2.23, 2.28, 1.63, 1.85, 1.90 for the A-P model, the Ogelman model, the Bahel model, the comprehensive model, and the Liu’s model, respectively. It is obvious that the selection of the radiation model and the empirical coefficient of the radiation model should be taken into full consideration; with regard to the errors of crop yield simulation caused by radiation models two factors should be taken into account: the errors of the five radiation models and these errors transmitted to the crop model with augmentation. Generally speaking, Scheme 4 has the smallest error compared with other schemes. Therefore it was recommended to use scheme 4 to drive APSIM model in the absence of field measured radiation.

Key words: Solar radiation model, Crop model, Simulation errors, Errors transmission, Northern China Plain