Spring-time fractional snow cover mapping in Northern Hemisphere with NPP Suomi/VIIRS within ESA DUE GlobSnow-2 project

Author

Metsamaki, Sari ; Hiltunen, Mwaba ; Luojus, Kari ; Pulliainen, Jouni

fYear

2014

fDate

13-18 July 2014

Firstpage

4002

Lastpage

4005

Abstract

Northern Hemisphere fractional snow cover (FSC) mapping based on NPP Suomi/VIIRS data is introduced. In ESA DUE-project GlobSnow, VIIRS-based snow mapping relies on SCAmod method particularly designed to provide accurate FSC estimates also in boreal forests. Three 8-day composites from year 2013 are compared with MOD10C2 products in order to catch their possible differences in the hemispheric scale. The results indicate that in general, GlobSnow VIIRS-based snow maps are characterized by the transitional (fractional snow) zone wider than that provided by MOD10C2 products. Moreover, fractional snow cover estimates for forested areas are generally higher for GlobSnow VIIRS-based products than for MOD10C2, suggesting that SCAmod method is very capable of detecting fractional snow in forests.

Keywords

snow; vegetation; AD 2013; ESA DUE GlobSnow-2 project; GlobSnow VIIRS-based product; GlobSnow VIIRS-based snow map; MOD10C2 product; NPP Suomi-VIIRS data; Northern Hemisphere FSC; SCAmod method; VIIRS-based snow mapping; accurate FSC estimation; boreal forest; forest fractional snow detection; forested area; fractional snow cover estimation; hemispheric scale difference; spring-time fractional snow cover mapping; transitional zone; Clouds; Optical sensors; Power capacitors; Remote sensing; Snow; Springs; FSC; Fractional snow cover; VIIRS; boreal forest;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS), 2014 IEEE International

Conference_Location

Quebec City, QC

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/IGARSS.2014.6947363

Filename

6947363