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Development of a Consistent GEOsat Cloud Property Dataset for the CERES Climate Data RecordCloud properties are critical for understanding the Earth’s radiation budget and cloud feedbacks. At NASA Langley Research Center, the Satellite ClOud and Radiative Property retrieval System (SatCORPS) provides real-time and historical analyses of clouds derived from Geostationary satellite (GEOsat) data for weather and climate applications. For the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) program, the global constellation of GEOsats has been analyzed since 2000 to help characterize and account for the diurnal cycle of clouds and their radiative impacts in the CERES climate data record. Obtaining consistent cloud properties over the GEOsat data record during the CERES era is a major objective but a significant challenge considering the diversity of imaging capabilities deployed during that time. The GEOsat data analysis approach for the current CERES Edition-4 (Ed4) data products was focused on accuracy and consistency with MODIS by employing as much spectral information as possible from each satellite. However, the inconsistent use of spectral information across GEOsats led to marked discontinuities in the spatial and temporal record of cloud properties that had to be accounted for post facto in downstream CERES processing. This paper reports progress in developing a new GEOsat analysis system for the next CERES edition (Ed5) that has potential to improve cross-platform consistency and continuity. In this approach, the spectral channel complement is limited to just 3-channels during daytime, ~0.65 µm (VIS), ~3.9 µm (NIR), and ~10.8 µm (IR), common to nearly all of the satellites in the record. At night, a 2-channel approach is taken with the NIR and IR, and ~6.7 µm bands that includes a machine learning approach for optically thick cloud properties. A tradeoff is the potential for reduced accuracy particularly using data from the more advanced satellites that have more spectral channels (e.g. SEVIRI, AHI and ABI) that are known to help improve thin cirrus detection, cloud-aerosol discrimination and estimates in other difficult conditions that challenge cloud remote sensing. The new continuity approach is applied to one month of global GEOSat data for each year of the CERES record since 2000 and compared with the Ed4 GEO and MODIS cloud property time series in order to evaluate the level of improved consistency in the GEOsat record and to assess the accuracy impacts. Cloud fraction will also be assessed with CALIPSO data. Outstanding issues and challenges will be discussed. The results are expected to guide future work needed to develop a more robust GEOsat cloud data record for CERES.
Document ID
20220013845
Acquisition Source
Langley Research Center
Document Type
Presentation
Authors
R. Palikonda
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
William L. Smith Jr.
(Langley Research Center Hampton, Virginia, United States)
David Painemal
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
Sarah Bedka
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
P. Minnis
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
Qing Trepte
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
Chris Yost
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
Cecilia Fleeger
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
Baojuan Shan
(Science Systems and Applications (United States) Lanham, Maryland, United States)
Date Acquired
September 9, 2022
Subject Category
Meteorology And Climatology
Meeting Information
Meeting: EUMETSAT Meteorological Satellite Conference 2022
Location: Brussels
Country: BE
Start Date: September 19, 2022
End Date: September 23, 2022
Sponsors: Airbus (United Kingdom), European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites
Funding Number(s)
WBS: 652528.02.01
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Public Use Permitted.
Keywords
CERES CDR
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