Effects of atmospheric emissivity on clear sky temperatures

The accurate determination of atmospheric temperatures from outgoing longwave radiation depends upon the effective atmospheric emissivity used in Stefan-Boltzmannʹs law. We reviewed the literature dealing with the atmospheric emissivity equations for clear sky and studied their effects on the clear sky atmospheric temperatures. The clear sky outgoing longwave radiation data were taken by the National Aeronautics and Space Administrationʹs (NASA) Earth Radiation Budget Satellite (ERBS) scanning radiometers. The five years (1985–1989) of global annual-mean of clear sky atmospheric temperatures with different emissivity values are presented and discussed in this paper. The effect of emissivity on the retrieval of clear sky atmospheric temperatures are found to vary by 7–8 K (Kelvin).