CM SAF - Satellite based surface radiation climatology

Satellite Application Facilities (SAFs) are dedicated centres of excellence for processing satellite data and form an integral part of EUMETSAT’s Application Ground Segment. The SAF on Climate Monitoring (CM SAF) derives climate data records of cloud parameters, radiation budget parameters and water vapour in the atmosphere from satellite data.
MeteoSwiss contributes time series of global radiation (=incoming solar radiation) at the earth’s surface to CM SAF. This includes the validation and improvement of the retrieval of the global radiation at the surface especially over complex terrain such as the Alps. Thereby, special attention is drawn to the radiative influence of snow. The distinction of snow and clouds is one of the biggest challenges in this procedure which includes proper treatment of the radiative properities of snow, i.e. additional reflections.
Our current efforts will yield a climatological time series of global radiation at the earth’s surface. The dataset is based on data from the Meteosat first and second generation satellites (1982-present) and covers the satellite’s visible disc (centered at the equator at 0°E/W). The dataset will be freely available through the CM SAF website (www.cmsaf.eu).