scholarly journals SENTINEL-2 SURFACE REFLECTANCE PRODUCTS GENERATED BY CNES AND DLR: METHODS, VALIDATION AND APPLICATIONS

2021 ◽  
Vol V-1-2021 ◽  
pp. 9-15
Author(s):  
O. Hagolle ◽  
J. Colin ◽  
S. Coustance ◽  
P. Kettig ◽  
P. D’Angelo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Weighted Average ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Surface Reflectance ◽  
Cloud Detection ◽  
In Situ Data ◽  
Multi Temporal ◽  
Cloud Mask ◽  
Sentinel 2

Abstract. To allow for a robust and automatic exploitation of Sentinel-2 data, Analysis Ready Data (ARD) products are requested by most users. The processors of ARD products take care of the common burdens necessary for most applications, that include precise orthorectification, cloud detection and atmospheric correction steps, as well as the generation of periodic syntheses of cloud free surface reflectances. The French Theia land data center, and the German Earth Observation Center (EOC) started delivering Sentinel-2 surface reflectance products to users in 2016 in France and 2019 in Germany respectively. Both centers produce and distribute these data sets in near real time, over large regions requested by French users such as Western Europe, Maghreb, Sahel, Madagascar… Theia’s and EOC products include an instantaneous surface reflectance product (Level-2A), and a monthly cloud free synthesis of surface reflectance (Level-3A). This article shortly describes the methods used to generate the Level-2A products with the MAJA processor, and the Level-3A products with theWASP processor. The MAJA processor is based on multi-temporal methods, that use the slow variation of surface reflectance to detect clouds and estimate aerosol depth, while WASP, thanks to the quality of MAJA cloud mask, calculates a weighted average of all the cloud free observations over 45 days, every month. The article also provides validation results for Level-2A and Level-3A products, resulting from comparison with in-situ data and with other methods. A last section gives first insights from the monitoring of user uptake of the distributed products.

scholarly journals RELATIVE RADIOMETRIC NORMALIZATION USING SEVERAL AUTOMATICALLY CHOSEN REFERENCE IMAGES FOR MULTI-SENSOR, MULTI-TEMPORAL SERIES

2020 ◽  
Vol V-2-2020 ◽  
pp. 845-852
Author(s):  
C. Hessel ◽  
R. Grompone von Gioi ◽  
J. M. Morel ◽  
G. Facciolo ◽  
P. Arias ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Time Series ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Linear Interpolation ◽  
Landsat 8 ◽  
Quality Metric ◽  
Multi Temporal ◽  
Reference Images ◽  
Random Sample Consensus ◽  
Affine Correction ◽  
Sentinel 2

Abstract. We propose a method for the relative radiometric normalization of long, multi-sensor image time series. This allows to increase the revisit time under comparable conditions. Although the relative radiometric normalization is a well-studied problem in the remote sensing community, the availability of an increasing number of images gives rise to new problems. For example, given long series spanning several years, finding features that are maintained through the whole period of time becomes arduous. Instead, we propose in this paper to use automatically detected reference images chosen by maximization of a quality metric. For each image, two affine correction models are robustly estimated using random sample consensus, using the two closest reference images; the final correction is obtained by linear interpolation. For each pair of source and reference images, pseudo-invariant features are obtained using a similarity measure invariant to radiometric changes. A final tone-mapping step outputs the images in the standard 8-bits range. This method is illustrated by the fusion of time series of Sentinel-2 at correction levels 1C, 2A, and Landsat-8 images. By using only the atmospherically corrected Sentinel-2 L2A images as anchors, the full output series inherits this atmospheric correction.

The improved thin cloud detection using BRDF model based background reflectance from GOCI geostationary satellite imagery

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jong-Min Yeom ◽  
Hye-Won Kim ◽  
Jeongho Lee ◽  
Seonyoung Park ◽  
Sangcherl Lee
Keyword(s):  
Land Surface ◽  
Ocean Color ◽  
Detection Algorithm ◽  
Land Application ◽  
Surface Reflectance ◽  
Cloud Detection ◽  
Land Area ◽  
Spectral Bands ◽  
Thin Cloud ◽  
Cloud Mask

<p>In this study, the improved algorithm of thin cloud detection for geostationary ocean color imager (GOCI) satellite was developed to classify the thin cloud area over land area. The new cloud mask approach of GOCI satellite is required to expand its ocean dedicated application to other applications such for vegetation in land or aerosol optical properties (AOPs) in atmosphere due to its attractive shortwave wavelength bands of ocean color sensors. However, when trying to apply the advantages of the ocean color bands to the land area, only visible spectral bands of GOCI make it difficult to expand the land application the other way due to its limitation of cloud detection for relatively bright land surface. Furthermore, the geostationary of GOCI satellite has highly sensitive to geometry location of sun, meaning that high effective (Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function) BRDF effects make it also difficult to detect cloud mask in land surface due to its anisotropically scattered surface reflectance. In this paper, cloud mask algorithm of GOCI is proposed to consider those limitations by mainly using background surface reflectance from BRDF model. Therefore, minimum difference in reflectance between TOA and land as baseline of clear atmosphere and background surface reflectance underneath cloud were estimated from BRDF model. In conclusion, our new thin cloud detection is effectively detect the thin cloud over land surface area under limited ocean color bands of GOCI. The improved thin cloud detection algorithm of GOCI will be not only useful for following on instruments such as GOCI-II of Geo-KOMPSAT-2B and Sentinel 3 Ocean and Land Color Instrument (OLCL), but also applicable for existing geostationary satellites such as Geo-KOMPSAT-2A AMI, Himawari, and GOES-R as alternative cloud masking approach.</p>

scholarly journals Scientific impact of MODIS C5 calibration degradation and C6+ improvements

2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (12) ◽  
pp. 4353-4365 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Lyapustin ◽  
Y. Wang ◽  
X. Xiong ◽  
G. Meister ◽  
S. Platnick ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Vegetation Index ◽  
Near Infrared ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Temporal Trends ◽  
Polarization Sensitivity ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Surface Reflectance ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Cross Calibration ◽  
Calibration Approach

Abstract. The Collection 6 (C6) MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) land and atmosphere data sets are scheduled for release in 2014. C6 contains significant revisions of the calibration approach to account for sensor aging. This analysis documents the presence of systematic temporal trends in the visible and near-infrared (500 m) bands of the Collection 5 (C5) MODIS Terra and, to lesser extent, in MODIS Aqua geophysical data sets. Sensor degradation is largest in the blue band (B3) of the MODIS sensor on Terra and decreases with wavelength. Calibration degradation causes negative global trends in multiple MODIS C5 products including the dark target algorithm's aerosol optical depth over land and Ångström exponent over the ocean, global liquid water and ice cloud optical thickness, as well as surface reflectance and vegetation indices, including the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and enhanced vegetation index (EVI). As the C5 production will be maintained for another year in parallel with C6, one objective of this paper is to raise awareness of the calibration-related trends for the broad MODIS user community. The new C6 calibration approach removes major calibrations trends in the Level 1B (L1B) data. This paper also introduces an enhanced C6+ calibration of the MODIS data set which includes an additional polarization correction (PC) to compensate for the increased polarization sensitivity of MODIS Terra since about 2007, as well as detrending and Terra–Aqua cross-calibration over quasi-stable desert calibration sites. The PC algorithm, developed by the MODIS ocean biology processing group (OBPG), removes residual scan angle, mirror side and seasonal biases from aerosol and surface reflectance (SR) records along with spectral distortions of SR. Using the multiangle implementation of atmospheric correction (MAIAC) algorithm over deserts, we have also developed a detrending and cross-calibration method which removes residual decadal trends on the order of several tenths of 1% of the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) reflectance in the visible and near-infrared MODIS bands B1–B4, and provides a good consistency between the two MODIS sensors. MAIAC analysis over the southern USA shows that the C6+ approach removed an additional negative decadal trend of Terra ΔNDVI ~ 0.01 as compared to Aqua data. This change is particularly important for analysis of vegetation dynamics and trends in the tropics, e.g., Amazon rainforest, where the morning orbit of Terra provides considerably more cloud-free observations compared to the afternoon Aqua measurements.

scholarly journals MODIS Collection 6 MAIAC Algorithm

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexei Lyapustin ◽  
Yujie Wang ◽  
Sergey Korkin ◽  
Dong Huang
Keyword(s):  
Missing Values ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Global Processing ◽  
Cloud Detection ◽  
Bidirectional Reflectance ◽  
Time Series Approach ◽  
Fine Mode ◽  
Spectral Regression ◽  
Cloud Mask ◽  
Aerosol Type

Abstract. This paper describes the latest version of algorithm MAIAC used for processing of the MODIS Collection 6 data record. Since initial publication in 2011–2012, MAIAC has changed considerably to adapt global processing and improve cloud/snow detection, aerosol retrievals and atmospheric correction of MODIS data. The main changes include 1) transition from 25 km to 1 km scale for retrieval of the spectral regression coefficient (SRC) which helped remove occasional blockiness at 25 km scale in the aerosol optical depth (AOD) and in the surface reflectance; 2) continuous improvements of cloud detection; 3) introduction of “Smoke” and “Dust” tests to discriminate absorbing fine and coarse mode aerosols; 4) adding over-water processing; 5) general optimization of the LUT-based radiative transfer for the global processing, and others. MAIAC provides an inter-disciplinary suite of atmospheric and land products, including: cloud mask (CM), column water vapor (CWV), AOD at 0.47 and 0.55 μm, aerosol type (background/smoke/dust), and fine mode fraction over water; spectral bidirectional reflectance factors (BRF), parameters of Ross-Thick Li-Sparse (RTLS) BRDF model and instantaneous albedo; for snow-covered surfaces, we provide sub-pixel snow fraction and snow grain size. All products come in standard HDF4 format at 1 km resolution, except BRF which is also provided at 500 m resolution, on Sinusoidal grid adopted by the MODIS land team. All products are provided on per-observation basis in daily files except BRDF/albedo which is reported every 8 days. Because MAIAC uses a time series approach, the BRDF/albedo are naturally gap-filled over land where missing values are filled-in with results from the previous retrieval. While the BRDF model is reported for MODIS land bands 1–7 and ocean band 8, BRF is reported for both land and ocean bands 1–12. This paper focuses on MAIAC cloud detection, aerosol retrievals and atmospheric correction and describes MCD19 data products and quality assurance (QA) flags.

scholarly journals Retrieval and mapping of chlorophyll-a concentration from Sentinel-2 images in an urban river in the semiarid region of Brazil

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Alessandro Rhadamek Alves Pereira ◽  
João Batista Lopes ◽  
Giovana Mira de Espindola ◽  
Carlos Ernando da Silva
Keyword(s):  
Chlorophyll A ◽  
River Mouth ◽  
Water Quality Monitoring ◽  
Semiarid Region ◽  
Surface Reflectance ◽  
Chlorophyll A Concentration ◽  
In Situ Data ◽  
Sentinel 2A ◽  
Sentinel 2

Recently, the Poti river mouth region has experienced environmental impacts that resulted in a change of landscape in its dry season, highlighting the eutrophication and proliferation of phytoplankton, algae, cyanobacteria and aquatic plants. Considering the aspects related to water-quality monitoring in the semiarid region of Brazil from remote sensing, this study aimed to evaluate the performance of Sentinel-2A satellite data in the retrieval of chlorophyll-a concentration in Poti River in Teresina, Piaui, Brazil. The chlorophyll-a concentration retrieval and mapping methodology involved the study of the water surface reflectance in Sentinel-2A images and their correlation with the chlorophyll-a data collected in situ during the years 2016 and 2017. The results generated by the Chl-1, Ha et al. (2017), Chl-2, Page et al. (2018), and Chl-3, Kuhn et al. (2019) equations show the need for calibrating the algorithms used for the Poti River water components. However, the empirical algorithm Chl-2 shows a correlation has been established to identify the spatiotemporal variation of chlorophyll-a concentration along the Poti River broadly and not punctually. The spatial distribution of this pigment in maps derived from Sentinel-2A is consistent with the pattern of occurrence determined by the in situ data. Therefore, the MSI sensor proved to be a tool suitable for the retrieval and monitoring of chlorophyll-a concentration along the Poti River.

scholarly journals MODIS Collection 6 MAIAC algorithm

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (10) ◽  
pp. 5741-5765 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexei Lyapustin ◽  
Yujie Wang ◽  
Sergey Korkin ◽  
Dong Huang
Keyword(s):  
Missing Values ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Global Processing ◽  
Cloud Detection ◽  
Bidirectional Reflectance ◽  
Time Series Approach ◽  
Fine Mode ◽  
Spectral Regression ◽  
Cloud Mask ◽  
Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution

Abstract. This paper describes the latest version of the algorithm MAIAC used for processing the MODIS Collection 6 data record. Since initial publication in 2011–2012, MAIAC has changed considerably to adapt to global processing and improve cloud/snow detection, aerosol retrievals and atmospheric correction of MODIS data. The main changes include (1) transition from a 25 to 1 km scale for retrieval of the spectral regression coefficient (SRC) which helped to remove occasional blockiness at 25 km scale in the aerosol optical depth (AOD) and in the surface reflectance, (2) continuous improvements of cloud detection, (3) introduction of smoke and dust tests to discriminate absorbing fine- and coarse-mode aerosols, (4) adding over-water processing, (5) general optimization of the LUT-based radiative transfer for the global processing, and others. MAIAC provides an interdisciplinary suite of atmospheric and land products, including cloud mask (CM), column water vapor (CWV), AOD at 0.47 and 0.55 µm, aerosol type (background, smoke or dust) and fine-mode fraction over water; spectral bidirectional reflectance factors (BRF), parameters of Ross-thick Li-sparse (RTLS) bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) model and instantaneous albedo. For snow-covered surfaces, we provide subpixel snow fraction and snow grain size. All products come in standard HDF4 format at 1 km resolution, except for BRF, which is also provided at 500 m resolution on a sinusoidal grid adopted by the MODIS Land team. All products are provided on per-observation basis in daily files except for the BRDF/Albedo product, which is reported every 8 days. Because MAIAC uses a time series approach, BRDF/Albedo is naturally gap-filled over land where missing values are filled-in with results from the previous retrieval. While the BRDF model is reported for MODIS Land bands 1–7 and ocean band 8, BRF is reported for both land and ocean bands 1–12. This paper focuses on MAIAC cloud detection, aerosol retrievals and atmospheric correction and describes MCD19 data products and quality assurance (QA) flags.

scholarly journals Impact of Various Atmospheric Corrections on Sentinel-2 Land Cover Classification Accuracy Using Machine Learning Classifiers

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 277 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luka Rumora ◽  
Mario Miler ◽  
Damir Medak
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Land Cover ◽  
Classification Accuracy ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Land Cover Classification ◽  
Support Vector ◽  
Atmospheric Effects ◽  
Surface Reflectance ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Sentinel 2

Atmospheric correction is one of the key parts of remote sensing preprocessing because it can influence and change the final classification result. This research examines the impact of five different atmospheric correction processing on land cover classification accuracy using Sentinel-2 satellite imagery. Those are surface reflectance (SREF), standardized surface reflectance (STDSREF), Sentinel-2 atmospheric correction (S2AC), image correction for atmospheric effects (iCOR), dark object subtraction (DOS) and top of the atmosphere (TOA) reflectance without any atmospheric correction. Sentinel-2 images corrected with stated atmospheric corrections were classified using four different machine learning classification techniques namely extreme gradient boosting (XGB), random forests (RF), support vector machine (SVM) and catboost (CB). For classification, five different classes were used: bare land, low vegetation, high vegetation, water and built-up area. SVM classification provided the best overall result for twelve dates, for all atmospheric corrections. It was the best method for both cases: when using Sentinel-2 bands and radiometric indices and when using just spectral bands. The best atmospheric correction for classification with SVM using radiometric indices is S2AC with the median value of 96.54% and the best correction without radiometric indices is STDSREF with the median value of 96.83%.

scholarly journals Casual Rerouting of AERONET Sun/Sky Photometers: Toward a New Network of Ground Measurements Dedicated to the Monitoring of Surface Properties?

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (16) ◽  
pp. 3072
Author(s):  
Dominique Carrer ◽  
Catherine Meurey ◽  
Olivier Hagolle ◽  
Guillaume Bigeard ◽  
Alexandre Paci ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Vegetation Index ◽  
Normalized Difference Vegetation Index ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Retrieval Algorithm ◽  
Surface Reflectance ◽  
The Sun ◽  
Cloud Detection ◽  
Ground Station ◽  
Vegetation Health

This paper presents an innovative method for observing vegetation health at a very high spatial resolution (~5 × 5 cm) and low cost by upgrading an existing Aerosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) ground station dedicated to the observation of aerosols in the atmosphere. This study evaluates the capability of a sun/sky photometer to perform additional surface reflectance observations. The ground station of Toulouse, France, which belongs to the AERONET sun/sky photometer network, is used for this feasibility study. The experiment was conducted for a 5-year period (between 2016 and 2020). The sun/sky photometer was mounted on a metallic structure at a height of 2.5 m, and the acquisition software was adapted to add a periodical (every hour) ground-observation scenario with the sun/sky photometer observing the surface instead of being inactive. Evaluation is performed by using a classical metric characterizing the vegetation health: the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), using as reference the satellite NDVI derived from a Sentinel-2 (S2) sensor at 10 × 10 m resolution. Comparison for the 5-year period showed good agreement between the S2 and sun/sky photometer NDVIs (i.e., bias = 0.004, RMSD = 0.082, and R = 0.882 for a mean value of S2A NDVI around 0.6). Discrepancies could have been due to spatial-representativeness issues (of the ground measurement compared to S2), the differences between spectral bands, and the quality of the atmospheric correction applied on S2 data (accuracy of the sun/sky photometer instrument was better than 0.1%). However, the accuracy of the atmospheric correction applied on S2 data in this station appeared to be of good quality, and no dependence on the presence of aerosols was observed. This first analysis of the potential of the CIMEL CE318 sun/sky photometer to monitor the surface is encouraging. Further analyses need to be carried out to estimate the potential in different AERONET stations. The occasional rerouting of AERONET stations could lead to a complementary network of surface reflectance observations. This would require an update of the software, and eventual adaptations of the measurement platforms to the station environments. The additional cost, based on the existing AERONET network, would be quite limited. These new surface measurements would be interesting for measurements of vegetation health (monitoring of NDVI, and also of other vegetation indices such as the leaf area and chlorophyll indices), for validation and calibration exercise purposes, and possibly to refine various scientific algorithms (i.e., algorithms dedicated to cloud detection or the AERONET aerosol retrieval algorithm itself). CIMEL is ready to include the ground scenario used in this study in all new sun/sky photometers.

scholarly journals Validation of Space-Based Albedo Products from Upscaled Tower-Based Measurements Over Heterogeneous and Homogeneous Landscapes

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
pp. 833
Author(s):  
Rui Song ◽  
Jan-Peter Muller ◽  
Said Kharbouche ◽  
Feng Yin ◽  
William Woodgate ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Resolution ◽  
Surface Albedo ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Atmospheric Correction ◽  
Landsat 8 ◽  
Surface Reflectance ◽  
Hemispherical Reflectance ◽  
Land Surfaces ◽  
Sentinel 2

Surface albedo is a fundamental radiative parameter as it controls the Earth’s energy budget and directly affects the Earth’s climate. Satellite observations have long been used to capture the temporal and spatial variations of surface albedo because of their continuous global coverage. However, space-based albedo products are often affected by errors in the atmospheric correction, multi-angular bi-directional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) modelling, as well as spectral conversions. To validate space-based albedo products, an in situ tower albedometer is often used to provide continuous “ground truth” measurements of surface albedo over an extended area. Since space-based albedo and tower-measured albedo are produced at different spatial scales, they can be directly compared only for specific homogeneous land surfaces. However, most land surfaces are inherently heterogeneous with surface properties that vary over a wide range of spatial scales. In this work, tower-measured albedo products, including both directional hemispherical reflectance (DHR) and bi-hemispherical reflectance (BHR), are upscaled to coarse satellite spatial resolutions using a new method. This strategy uses high-resolution satellite derived surface albedos to fill the gaps between the albedometer’s field-of-view (FoV) and coarse satellite scales. The high-resolution surface albedo is generated from a combination of surface reflectance retrieved from high-resolution Earth Observation (HR-EO) data and moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) BRDF climatology over a larger area. We implemented a recently developed atmospheric correction method, the Sensor Invariant Atmospheric Correction (SIAC), to retrieve surface reflectance from HR-EO (e.g., Sentinel-2 and Landsat-8) top-of-atmosphere (TOA) reflectance measurements. This SIAC processing provides an estimated uncertainty for the retrieved surface spectral reflectance at the HR-EO pixel level and shows excellent agreement with the standard Landsat 8 Surface Reflectance Code (LaSRC) in retrieving Landsat-8 surface reflectance. Atmospheric correction of Sentinel-2 data is vastly improved by SIAC when compared against the use of in situ AErosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) data. Based on this, we can trace the uncertainty of tower-measured albedo during its propagation through high-resolution EO measurements up to coarse satellite scales. These upscaled albedo products can then be compared with space-based albedo products over heterogeneous land surfaces. In this study, both tower-measured albedo and upscaled albedo products are examined at Ground Based Observation for Validation (GbOV) stations (https://land.copernicus.eu/global/gbov/), and used to compare with satellite observations, including Copernicus Global Land Service (CGLS) based on ProbaV and VEGETATION 2 data, MODIS and multi-angle imaging spectroradiometer (MISR).

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