Chapter 24
AUSTRALIAN SITES FOR THE VALIDATION OF
SATELLITE RETRIEVALS OF THE RADIATIVE
PROPERTIES OF LAND SURFACES
I. F. Grant (1), A. J. Prata (1), G. Rondeaux (2) and M. D. Steven (2)
(1) CSIRO, Division of Atmospheric Research, Australia and (2) Department of Geography,
University of Nottingham, United Kingdom.
1.
INTRODUCTION
The radiation budget at the Earth’s surface is an important component of
the climate system. Climate research needs global observations of the
surface radiation budget (SRB) parameters in order, for instance, to validate
the output of numerical climate models and to improve the parameterization
of radiation in models. Satellite-based retrievals of SRB parameters over
land must address the directional reflectance properties of the land surface,
as well as spatial inhomogeneity, the effect of the atmosphere, and spectral
and temporal sampling by the satellite sensor.
The long-term validation of SRB retrievals is difficult because groundbased measurements of the upwelling radiation fluxes are seldom
representative of the
pixels of many current and planned satellite
sensors. Therefore, Australia’s CSIRO has established the Continental
Integrated Ground-truth Site Network (CIGSN) for the validation of satellite
retrievals of surface radiation fluxes and related parameters such as albedo
and land surface temperature.
229
M.M. Verstraete et al. (eds.), Observing Land from Space: Science, Customers and Technology, 229–241.
© 2000 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
AUSTRALIAN SITES FOR THE VALIDATION OF
SATELLITE RETRIEVALS OF THE RADIATIVE
PROPERTIES OF LAND SURFACES
I. F. Grant (1), A. J. Prata (1), G. Rondeaux (2) and M. D. Steven (2)
(1) CSIRO, Division of Atmospheric Research, Australia and (2) Department of Geography,
University of Nottingham, United Kingdom.
1.
INTRODUCTION
The radiation budget at the Earth’s surface is an important component of
the climate system. Climate research needs global observations of the
surface radiation budget (SRB) parameters in order, for instance, to validate
the output of numerical climate models and to improve the parameterization
of radiation in models. Satellite-based retrievals of SRB parameters over
land must address the directional reflectance properties of the land surface,
as well as spatial inhomogeneity, the effect of the atmosphere, and spectral
and temporal sampling by the satellite sensor.
The long-term validation of SRB retrievals is difficult because groundbased measurements of the upwelling radiation fluxes are seldom
representative of the
pixels of many current and planned satellite
sensors. Therefore, Australia’s CSIRO has established the Continental
Integrated Ground-truth Site Network (CIGSN) for the validation of satellite
retrievals of surface radiation fluxes and related parameters such as albedo
and land surface temperature.
229
M.M. Verstraete et al. (eds.), Observing Land from Space: Science, Customers and Technology, 229–241.
© 2000 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.