Thermal force perturbations of the LAGEOS orbit: the albedo radiation part

A role of the Earth reflected radiation heating for the thermal effects perturbing the motion of the LAGEOS satellite is clarified. A small, but not negligible, part of the constant drag acting on the satellite and detected via the orbit analysis is attributed to this phenomenon. The contribution to the observed eccentricity excitations is very small in contrast to the hopes raised in the recent analysis by Métris et al. (1996).