Application of a simple algorithm to estimate daily evapotranspiration from NOAA–AVHRR images for the Iberian Peninsula

International audience; Evapotranspiration (ET) is a key process in land surface–atmosphere studies. It mainly depends on water availability and incoming solar radiation and then reflects the interactions between surface water processes and climate. In this paper, a methodology for retrieving ET from low spatial resolution remote sensing data is presented. It is based on the evaporative fraction concept, and it has been applied to Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AHVRR) data acquired over the Iberian Peninsula. The methodology does not require other data than the data provided by the satellite and may be applied to areas with almost spatially constant atmospheric conditions and whi…

Synergistic use of MERIS and AATSR as a proxy for estimating Land Surface Temperature from Sentinel-3 data

Land Surface Temperature (LST) is one of the key parameters in the physics of land-surface processes on regional and global scales, combining the results of all surface-atmosphere interactions and energy fluxes between the surface and the atmosphere. With the advent of the ESA's Sentinel 3 (S3) satellite, accurate LST retrieval methodologies exploiting the synergy between OLCI and SLSTR instruments can be developed. In this paper we propose a candidate methodology for retrieving LST from data acquired with the forthcoming S3 instruments. The LST algorithm is based on the Split-Window (SW) technique with an explicit dependence on surface emissivity, in contrast to the AATSR level 2 algorithm…

Temporal analysis of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and land surface temperature (LST) parameters to detect changes in the Iberian land cover between 1981 and 2001

In past decades, the Iberian Peninsula has been shown to have suffered vegetation changes such as desertification and reforestation. Normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and land surface temperature (LST) parameters, estimated from data acquired by the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) sensor onboard the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellite series, are particularly adapted to assess these changes. This work presents an application of the yearly land-cover dynamics (YLCD) methodology to analyse the behaviour of the vegetation, which consists of a combined multitemporal study of the NDVI and LST parameters on a yearly basis. Throughout the 1…

Discriminating irrigated and rainfed olive orchards with thermal ASTER imagery and DART 3D simulation

Article in Press

Vicarious Calibration of the Landsat 7 Thermal Infrared Band and LST Algorithm Validation of the ETM+ Instrument Using Three Global Atmospheric Profiles

Due to problems in the thermal infrared sensor on-board the Landsat-8 satellite, Landsat-7 (L7) can be an interesting alternative source of thermal data because it is the only source of well-calibrated, free, high-resolution data. To contribute to the quality of thermal data, a vicarious calibration (VC) of the enhanced thematic mapper instrument and a validation of the single-channel general equation and the water vapor approach algorithm in conjunction with an inversion of the radiative transfer equation (RTE) have been performed during 2013–2015 over two Spanish test sites. For this purpose, three global atmospheric profile data sets were used to better characterize the error due to atmo…

Land use classification from multitemporal Landsat imagery using the Yearly Land Cover Dynamics (YLCD) method

Abstract Several previous studies have shown that the inclusion of the LST (Land Surface Temperature) parameter to a NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) based classification procedure is beneficial to classification accuracy. In this work, the Yearly Land Cover Dynamics (YLCD) approach, which is based on annual behavior of LST and NDVI, has been used to classify an agricultural area into crop types. To this end, a time series of Landsat-5 images for year 2009 of the Barrax (Spain) area has been processed: georeferenciation, destriping and atmospheric correction have been carried out to estimate NDVI and LST time series for year 2009, from which YLCD parameters were estimated. Then…

Temperature and Emissivity Separation From MSG/SEVIRI Data

In this paper, we analyze the feasibility of applying the temperature and emissivity separation (TES) algorithm to thermal-infrared data acquired with three bands of the Spinning Enhanced Visible and Infrared Imager (SEVIRI) onboard the Meteosat Second Generation platform (SEVTES). The performance of the SEVTES algorithm was tested using data simulated over different atmospheric conditions and surface emissivities, with errors around 1.5% for emissivity and 1.5 K for temperature when atmospheric correction is accurate enough. In contrast, errors on land-leaving radiances higher than 2% or uncertainties on total atmospheric water vapor amount higher than 5% lead to errors on emissivity highe…

Land surface temperature retrieval from LANDSAT TM 5

In this paper, three methods to retrieve the land surface temperature (LST) from thermal infrared data supplied by band 6 of the Thematic Mapper (TM) sensor onboard the Landsat 5 satellite are compared. The first of them lies on the estimation of the land surface temperature from the radiative transfer equation using in situ radiosounding data. The others two are the mono-window algorithm developed by Qin et al. [International Journal of Remote Sensing 22 (2001) 3719] and the single-channel algorithm developed by Jime´nez-Mun˜oz and Sobrino [Journal of Geophysical Research 108 (2003)]. The land surface emissivity (LSE) values needed in order to apply these methods have been estimated from a…

Multi-temporal analysis of MODIS Land Products over the Amazon region

In a global warming scenario there is an increase interest in examining climate trends at specific biomes such as the tropical rainforest biome. The Amazonian region is the largest carbon sink, so changes in this area are expected to have a direct impact over the climate change. In this work we analyse the temporal evolution (trends and anomalies) of different land parameters from 2001 to 2010 over the Amazonian forest. For this purpose, we used Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Land Products at 0.05° latitude/longitude Climate Modeling Grid (CMG), namely, combined Terra/Aqua 16-day Albedo (MCD43C3), Terra monthly Land Surface Temperature & Emissivity (MOD11C3), Terra mo…

Error sources on the land surface temperature retrieved from thermal infrared single channel remote sensing data

In this paper, a theoretical study complementary to others given in the literature about the errors committed on the land surface temperature retrieved from the radiative transfer equation in the thermal infrared region by remote sensing techniques has been analysed. For this purpose, the MODTRAN 3.5 code has been used in order to simulate different conditions and evaluate the influence of several parameters on the land surface temperature accuracy: atmospheric correction, noise of the sensor, land surface emissivity, aerosols and other gaseous absorbers, angular effects, wavelength uncertainty, full‐width half‐maximum of the sensor and band‐pass effects. The results show that the most impo…

Correction to “A generalized single-channel method for retrieving land surface temperature from remote sensing data” by Juan C. Jiménez-Muñoz and José A. Sobrino

A combined optical-microwave method to retrieve soil moisture over vegetated areas

A simple approach for correcting for the effect of vegetation in the estimation of the surface soil moisture (wS) from L-band passive microwave observations is presented in this study. The approach is based on semi-empirical relationships between soil moisture and the polarized reflectivity including the effect of the vegetation optical depth which is parameterized as a function of the normalized vegetation difference index (NDVI). The method was tested against in situ measurements collected over a grass site from 2004 to 2007 (SMOSREX experiment). Two polarizations (horizontal/vertical) and five incidence angles (20◦, 30◦, 40◦, 50◦, and 60◦) were considered in the analysis. The best wS est…

A database for the monitoring of thermal anomalies over the Amazon forest and adjacent intertropical oceans

AbstractAdvances in information technologies and accessibility to climate and satellite data in recent years have favored the development of web-based tools with user-friendly interfaces in order to facilitate the dissemination of geo/biophysical products. These products are useful for the analysis of the impact of global warming over different biomes. In particular, the study of the Amazon forest responses to drought have recently received attention by the scientific community due to the occurrence of two extreme droughts and sustained warming over the last decade. Thermal Amazoni@ is a web-based platform for the visualization and download of surface thermal anomalies products over the Ama…

Validation of a temperature emissivity separation hybrid method from airborne hyperspectral scanner data and ground measurements in the SEN2FLEX field campaign

This paper presents an assessment of the performance of a hybrid method that allows a simultaneous retrieval of land-surface temperature (LST) and emissivity (LSE) from remotely-sensed data. The proposed method is based on a synergistic usage of the split-window (SW) algorithm and the two-temperature method (TTM) and combines the advantages of both procedures while mitigating their drawbacks. The method was implemented for thermal channels 76 (10.56 µm) and 78 (11.72 µm) of the Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner (AHS), which was flown over the Barrax test site (Albacete, Spain) in the second week of July 2005, within the framework of the Sentinel-2 and Fluorescence Experiment (SEN2FLEX) field c…

Improvements in land surface temperature retrieval from the Landsat series thermal band using water vapor and air temperature

[1] Land surface temperature (LST) is involved in many land surface processes such as evapotranspiration, net radiation, or air temperature modeling. In this paper we present an improved methodology to retrieve LST from Landsat 4 TM, Landsat 5 TM, and Landsat 7 ETM+ using four atmospheric databases covering different water vapor ranges (from 0 to 8 g cm−2) to build the LST retrieval models and using both water vapor and air temperature as input variables. We also compare this with LST retrievals using only water vapor or only air temperature, as well as with an existing LST retrieval algorithm. In order to validate the results, we have selected 77 Landsat images taken between 2002 and 2006 …

Single-channel and two-channel methods for land surface temperature retrieval from DAIS data and its application to the Barrax site

In this paper, a methodology using a single-channel and a two-channel method is presented to estimate the land surface temperature from the DAIS (Digital Airborne Imaging Spectrometer) thermal channels 74 (8.747 µm), 75 (9.648 µm), 76 (10.482 µm), 77 (11.266 µm), 78 (11.997 µm) and 79 (12.668 µm). The land surface temperature retrieved with both methods has been validated over the Barrax site (Albacete, Spain) in the framework of the DAISEX (Digital Airborne Imaging Spectrometer Experiment) field campaigns. Prior to the validation an analysis of the DAIS data quality has been performed in order to check the agreement between in situ data and the values extracted from the DAIS images supplie…

Has the Northern Hemisphere been warming or cooling during the boreal winter of the last few decades?

Abstract The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported a significant rise of the global mean surface temperature over the last 100 years, with a rate of warming over the last few decades almost double that over the last 100 years. The rate of warming is higher at land surfaces over the Northern Hemisphere (NH), and particularly extreme warming is occurring over the Arctic. In spite of the global warming trend, some asymmetries have been observed. In a recent study, a widespread cooling over the NH during the boreal winter season was reported, although other previous studies observed a warming during this season. In this paper we report trends in winter air temperatures over …

Episodios térmicos extremos analizados con productos MODIS durante el invierno boreal (2000-2016)

<p>The beginning of the XXI century is characterized by the intensification of the existing global warming situation and for a series of drastic global meteorological events. Particularly, during the winter season a series of extreme temperature episodes affecting large areas of the northern hemisphere have been produced. In this paper, these episodes are studied by analyzing the thermal anomalies spatial distribution and temporal evolution in the period 2001-2016 from Land Surface Temperature (LST) products obtained from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensor. The study regions considered in this investigation are eight of the northern hemisphere. The result…

Atmospheric correction of optical imagery from MODIS and Reanalysis atmospheric products

article i nfo In this paper we analyze the differences obtained in the atmospheric correction of optical imagery covering bands located in the Visible and Near Infra-Red (VNIR), Short-Wave Infra-Red (SWIR) and Themal-Infrared (TIR) spectral regions when atmospheric profiles extracted from different sources are used. In particular, three sensors were used, Compact High Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (CHRIS), Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection radiometer (ASTER) and Landsat5 Thematic Mapper (TM), whereas four atmospheric profiles sources were considered: i) local soundings launched near the sensor overpass time, ii) Moderate Resolution Radiometer (MODIS) atmospheric profiles…

Thermal remote sensing from Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner data in the framework of the SPARC and SEN2FLEX projects: an overview

Abstract. The AHS (Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner) instrument has 80 spectral bands covering the visible and near infrared (VNIR), short wave infrared (SWIR), mid infrared (MIR) and thermal infrared (TIR) spectral range. The instrument is operated by Instituto Nacional de Técnica Aerospacial (INTA), and it has been involved in several field campaigns since 2004. This paper presents an overview of the work performed with the AHS thermal imagery provided in the framework of the SPARC and SEN2FLEX campaigns, carried out respectively in 2004 and 2005 over an agricultural area in Spain. The data collected in both campaigns allowed for the first time the development and testing of algorithms for …

Thermal remote sensing in the framework of the SEN2FLEX project: field measurements, airborne data and applications

A description of thermal radiometric field measurements carried out in the framework of the European project SENtinel-2 and Fluorescence Experiment (SEN2FLEX) is presented. The field campaign was developed in the region of Barrax (Spain) during June and July 2005. The purpose of the thermal measurements was to retrieve biogeophysical parameters such as land surface emissivity (LSE) and temperature (LST) to validate airborne-based methodologies and to characterize different surfaces. Thermal measurements were carried out using two multiband field radiometers and several broadband field radiometers, pointing at different targets. High-resolution images acquired with the Airborne Hyperspectral…

Comparison Between Fractional Vegetation Cover Retrievals from Vegetation Indices and Spectral Mixture Analysis: Case Study of PROBA/CHRIS Data Over an Agricultural Area

Abstract: In this paper we compare two different methodologies for Fractional Vegetation Cover (FVC) retrieval from Compact High Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (CHRIS) data onboard the European Space Agency (ESA) Project for On-Board Autonomy (PROBA) platform. The first methodology is based on empirical approaches using Vegetation Indices (VIs), in particular the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and the Variable Atmospherically Resistant Index (VARI). The second methodology is based on the Spectral Mixture Analysis (SMA) technique, in which a Linear Spectral Unmixing model has been considered in order to retrieve the abundance of the different constituent materials within pixe…

Emissitivity spectra obtained from field and laboratory measurements using the temperature and emissivity separation algorithm.

Surface emissivities play an important role in thermal remote sensing, since knowledge of them is required to estimate land surface temperature with enough accuracy. They are also important in other environmental or geological studies. We show the results obtained for the emissivity spectra of different natural surfaces (water, green, and senescent vegetation) by applying the temperature and emissivity separation (TES) algorithm to ground-based measurements collected at the field with a multiband thermal radiometer. The results have been tested with data included in spectral libraries, and rms errors lower than 0.01 have been found, except for senescent vegetation. Two methods are also prop…

Improved Temperature and Emissivity Separation Algorithm for Multispectral and Hyperspectral Sensors

The Temperature and Emissivity Separation (TES) algorithm was originally developed for the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER). This paper focuses on improving the TES algorithm. The main modification is the replacement of the normalized emissivity module with a new module, which is based on the smoothing of spectral radiance signatures. Smoothing is performed by estimating emissivity using an optimized approximation of the relationship between brightness temperature and emissivity. The improved TES algorithm, which is called Optimized Smoothing for Temperature Emissivity Separation (OSTES), was first tested on simulated data from three different sensors, …

Soil emissivity and reflectance spectra measurements

We present an analysis of the laboratory reflectance and emissivity spectra of 11 soil samples collected on different field campaigns carried out over a diverse suite of test sites in Europe, North Africa, and South America from 2002 to 2008. Hemispherical reflectance spectra were measured from 2.0 to 14 microm with a Fourier transform infrared spectrometer, and x-ray diffraction analysis (XRD) was used to determine the mineralogical phases of the soil samples. Emissivity spectra were obtained from the hemispherical reflectance measurements using Kirchhoff's law and compared with in situ radiance measurements obtained with a CIMEL Electronique CE312-2 thermal radiometer and converted to emi…

Land surface temperature retrieval from thermal infrared data: An assessment in the context of the Surface Processes and Ecosystem Changes Through Response Analysis (SPECTRA) mission

[1] SPECTRA (Surface Processes and Ecosystem Changes Through Response Analysis) is one of the core candidate missions which is being proposed for implementation in the European Space Agency (ESA) Earth Explorer program of research oriented missions. The scientific objective of the SPECTRA mission is to describe, understand, and model the role of terrestrial vegetation in the global carbon cycle and its response to climate variability under the increasing pressure of human activity. The SPECTRA satellite will embark an optical hyperspectral payload covering the solar spectral range (0.4 to 2.4 μm) and thermal infrared region (10.3 to 12.3 μm). This paper is focused on the land surface temper…

Near real-time estimation of Sea and Land surface temperature for MSG SEVIRI sensors

Abstract Land and Sea Surface Temperatures (LST and SST) are both recognized as Essential Climate Variables, and are routinely retrieved by a wealth of satellites. However, for validated approaches, the latest data are usually not available to the general public. We offer to bridge this gap, by using Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) Spinning Enhanced Visible and InfraRed Imager (SEVIRI), with its 15 min temporal resolution. Here, we present generic algorithms for the retrieval of both LST and SST, valid for the SEVIRI instrument onboard MSG platforms 8–11, which we validate using hourly data of 4 ground stations and 11 buoys in Spain over the years 2015 to 2018. These validations show that …

In-scene atmospheric correction of hyperspectral thermal infrared images with nadir, horizontal, and oblique view angles

Atmospheric corrections for hyperspectral thermal images acquired with nadir, horizontal, and oblique views have typically relied on atmospheric modelling software, such as Moderate Resolution Atmospheric Transmission MODTRAN, to estimate atmospheric parameters. Data-only corrections, which require only information from the scene, are more versatile and less labour intensive, but do not yet seem to have been applied to horizontal and oblique views. Here, we apply, and modify where necessary, one published data-only algorithm in-scene atmospheric correction ISAC to nadir, horizontal, and slanted views The Aerospace Corporation's Spatially Enhanced Broadband Array Spectrograph System SEBASS a…

Emissivity mapping over urban areas using a classification-based approach: Application to the Dual-use European Security IR Experiment (DESIREX)

Abstract In this work a methodology to provide an emissivity map of an urban area is presented. The methodology is applied to the city of Madrid (Spain) using data provided by the Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner (AHS) in 2008. From the data a classification map with twelve different urban materials was created. Each material was then characterized by a different emissivity, whose values were obtained from the application of the TES algorithm to in situ measurements and values extracted from the ASTER spectral library. This new emissivity map could be used as a basis for determining the temperature of the city and to understand the urban heat island effect in terms of spatial distribution and…

Mapping sub-pixel burnt percentage using AVHRR data. Application to the Alcalaten area in Spain

The purpose of this work is to estimate at sub-pixel scale the percentage of burnt land using the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer AVHRR through a simple approach. This methodology is based on multi-temporal spectral mixture analysis MSMA, which uses a normalized difference vegetation index NDVI and a land-surface temperature LST image as input bands. The area of study is located in the Alcalaten region in Castellon Spain, a typical semi-arid Mediterranean region. The results have shown an extension of approximately 55 km2 affected by fire, which is only 5% lower than the statistic reports provided by the Environmental Ministry of Spain. Finally, we include a map of the area showing…

Digital thermal monitoring of the Amazon forest: an intercomparison of satellite and reanalysis products

Remote sensing and climate digital products have become increasingly available in recent years. Access to these products has favored a variety of Digital Earth studies, such as the analysis of the impact of global warming over different biomes. The study of the Amazon forest response to drought has recently received particular attention from the scientific community due to the occurrence of extreme droughts and anomalous warming over the last decade. This paper focuses on the differences observed between surface thermal anomalies obtained from remote sensing moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) and climatic (ERA-Interim) monthly products over the Amazon forest. With a few e…

Detection of Water Stress in an Olive Orchard with Thermal Remote Sensing Imagery

An investigation of the detection of water stress in non-homogeneous crop canopies such as orchards using high-spatial resolution remote sensing thermal imagery is presented. An airborne campaign was conducted with the Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner (AHS) acquiring imagery in 38 spectral bands in the 0.43–12.5 mm spectral range at 2.5 m spatial resolution. The AHS sensor was flown at 7:30, 9:30 and 12:30 GMT in 25 July 2004 over an olive orchard with three different water-deficit irrigation treatments to study the spatial and diurnal variability of temperature as a function of water stress. A total of 10 AHS bands located within the thermal-infrared region were assessed for the retrieval of…

Evapotranspiration Estimation with the S-SEBI Method from Landsat 8 Data against Lysimeter Measurements at the Barrax Site, Spain

Evapotranspiration (ET) is a variable of the climatic system and hydrological cycle that plays an important role in biosphere–atmosphere–hydrosphere interactions. In this paper, remote sensing-based ET estimates with the simplified surface energy balance index (S-SEBI) model using Landsat 8 data were compared with in situ lysimeter measurements for different land covers (Grass, Wheat, Barley, and Vineyard) at the Barrax site, Spain, for the period 2014–2018. Daily estimates produced superior performance than hourly estimates in all the land covers, with an average difference of 12% and 15% for daily and hourly ET estimates, respectively. Grass and Vineyard showed the best performance, with …

Accuracy of ASTER Level-2 thermal-infrared Standard Products of an agricultural area in Spain

Abstract The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) collects five-channel thermal-infrared images that are calibrated, corrected for atmospheric effects, and then converted to land surface temperature and emissivity products by the ASTER Temperature/Emissivity Separation (TES) algorithm. TES scales low- and high-contrast surfaces differently, and has been validated over water (low contrast) and rock (high contrast). Performance of TES over agricultural areas, however, has not been evaluated specifically. To address this issue, field measurements of “ground truth” were made over bare soil in addition to green grass, alfalfa and corn, at an agricultural researc…

Land Surface Temperature Retrieval Methods From Landsat-8 Thermal Infrared Sensor Data

The importance of land surface temperature (LST) retrieved from high to medium spatial resolution remote sensing data for many environmental studies, particularly the applications related to water resources management over agricultural sites, was a key factor for the final decision of including a thermal infrared (TIR) instrument on board the Landsat Data Continuity Mission or Landsat-8. This new TIR sensor (TIRS) includes two TIR bands in the atmospheric window between 10 and 12 $\mu\hbox{m}$ , thus allowing the application of split-window (SW) algorithms in addition to single-channel (SC) algorithms or direct inversions of the radiative transfer equation used in previous sensors on board …

Evaluation of Terra/MODIS atmospheric profiles product (MOD07) over the Iberian Peninsula: a comparison with radiosonde stations

Remote sensing techniques are a useful tool for continuous observation of the Earth at global scale. However, products derived from remote sensing data require a rigorous validation using in situ data. Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) is not really a sounding instrument, but it does have 16 infrared bands (bands 20–36 covering the spectral range from 3 µm to 14 µm) that allow the retrieval of temperature and moisture profiles as well as total column integrated magnitudes. In this paper we show the results obtained in the evaluation of MOD07 daytime and nighttime products over the Iberian Peninsula during the decade from 2000 to 2010 using nine radiosonde stations. Altho…

Record-breaking warming and extreme drought in the Amazon rainforest during the course of El Niño 2015–2016

AbstractThe El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is the main driver of interannual climate extremes in Amazonia and other tropical regions. The current 2015/2016 EN event was expected to be as strong as the EN of the century in 1997/98, with extreme heat and drought over most of Amazonian rainforests. Here we show that this protracted EN event, combined with the regional warming trend, was associated with unprecedented warming and a larger extent of extreme drought in Amazonia compared to the earlier strong EN events in 1982/83 and 1997/98. Typical EN-like drought conditions were observed only in eastern Amazonia, whilst in western Amazonia there was an unusual wetting. We attribute this wet…

Surface Emissivity Retrieval From Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner Data: Insights on Atmospheric Correction and Noise Removal

Airborne multispectral imagers have been used in validation campaigns in order to acquire very high spatial resolution data as a benchmark for current or future satellite data. Imagery acquired with such sensors implies specific data processing in relation to view-angle-dependent atmospheric correction and removal or minimization of stripping-based noise. It is necessary to appropriately perform this processing in order to benefit from reference imageries of surface temperature (T) and emissivity (e) maps retrieved from thermal infrared data. In particular, e images generated from T/e separation algorithms show undesirable noise that jeopardizes their photointerpretation. This letter addres…

Assessing Canopy PRI for Water Stress detection with Diurnal Airborne Imagery

Soil Moisture Experiments 2004 (SMEX04) Special Issue

A Single-Channel Algorithm for Land-Surface Temperature Retrieval From ASTER Data

This letter presents an adaptation to Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) data of the generalized single-channel (SC) algorithm developed by JimE?nez-MuN?oz and Sobrino, also adapted to the Landsat thermal-infrared (TIR) channel (band 6) later by JimE?nez-MuN?oz The SC algorithm relies on the concept of atmospheric functions (AFs), which are dependent on atmospheric transmissivity, upwelling, and downwelling atmospheric radiances. These AFs are fitted versus the atmospheric water-vapor content for operational purposes, despite the fact that other computation options are also possible. The SC algorithm has been adapted to ASTER TIR bands 13 (10.659 ?m) and …

Review of thermal infrared applications and requirements for future high-resolution sensors

High-resolution thermal infrared (TIR) remote sensing has a wide range of applications. In this paper, we describe the different applications and requirements identified in a literature review and during a consultation meeting with researcher experts in different fields. As a result, more than 30 applications were identified within three different fields: 1) land and solid Earth; 2) health and hazards; and 3) security and surveillance. A complete set of requirements (spatial, temporal, and radiometric resolution, algorithms used, and supporting data, among others) for each application is also provided. The results presented in this paper provide useful information to enhance the importance …

Monitoring Yield and Fruit quality parameters in Open-Canopy Tree crops under Water Stress. Implications for ASTER

Work on water stress detection at tree and orchard levels using a high-spatial airborne thermal sensor is presented, showing its connection with yield and some fruit quality indicators in olive and peach commercial orchards under different irrigation regimes. Two airborne campaigns were conducted with the Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner (AHS) over olive and peach orchards located in Córdoba, southern Spain. The AHS sensor was flown at three different times on 25 July 2004 and 16 July 2005, collecting 2 m spatial resolution imagery in 80 spectral bands in the 0.43– 12.5 μm spectral range. Thermal bands were assessed for the retrieval of land surface temperature using the split-window algorith…

Land surface temperature derived from airborne hyperspectral scanner thermal infrared data

Abstract The AHS (airborne hyperspectral scanner) instrument has 80 spectral bands covering the visible and near infrared (VNIR), short wave infrared (SWIR), mid-infrared (MIR), and thermal infrared (TIR) spectral range. The instrument is operated by Instituto Nacional de Tecnica Aerospacial (INTA) and it has been involved in several field campaigns since 2004. The main goal of this paper is to analyze the feasibility of retrieving land surface temperature from the 10 AHS thermal infrared bands, from 71 to 80, located in the region between 8 and 13 μm. For this purpose, three different methods have been considered: (i) the single-channel method, which uses only one thermal band; (ii) the sp…

A generalized single‐channel method for retrieving land surface temperature from remote sensing data

[1] Many papers have developed algorithms to retrieve land surface temperature from at-sensor and land surface emissivity data. These algorithms have been specified for different thermal sensors on board satellites, i.e., the algorithm used for one thermal sensor (or a combination of thermal sensors) cannot be used for other thermal sensor. The main goal of this paper is to propose a generalized single-channel algorithm that only uses the total atmospheric water vapour content and the channel effective wavelength (assuming that emissivity is known), and can be applied to thermal sensors characterized with a FWHM (Full-Width Half-Maximum) of around 1 μm actually operative on board satellites…

Split-Window Coefficients for Land Surface Temperature Retrieval From Low-Resolution Thermal Infrared Sensors

In this letter, we provide a complete set of split-window coefficients that can be used to retrieve land surface temperature (LST) from thermal infrared sensors onboard the most popular remote-sensing satellites: ERS-ATSR2, ENVISAT-AATSR, Terra/Aqua-MODIS, NOAA series-AVHRR, METOP-AVHRR3, GOES series-IMAGER, and MSG1/MSG2-SEVIRI. The coefficients have been obtained by minimization from an extensive simulated database constructed from MODTRAN radiative transfer code calculations, emissivity spectra extracted from spectral libraries, and spectral response functions of the thermal bands considered. This letter also analyzes the magnitude of the error on the LST retrieval and the contribution t…

Review of High Resolution Thermal Infrared Applications and Requirements: The Fuegosat Synthesis Study

High resolution thermal infrared remote sensing can have a wide range of applications. In this chapter we describe the different applications and requirements identified after a revision study in the framework of the Fuegosat Synthesis Study (FSS). This project was funded by the European Space Agency (ESA), and the three main objectives were: (i) review of applications and analyses for user requirements, (ii) consolidation of user requirements over a broad range of applications, and (iii) matching of user requirements and industry concepts to identify and outline a set of potential mission scenarios and their corresponding requirements. This chapter focuses on issues (i) and (ii). These obj…

Comment on "Ecological importance of the thermal emissivity of avian eggshells".

Eggshell emissivity must be known to determine accurately the cooling rate of avian eggs when the parent, after heating by conduction during the incubation, is temporarily absent. We estimate possible values of eggshell emissivities from in-situ measurements and spectral libraries. Emissivity is near to 1 (probably higher than 0.95) and therefore its effect on cooling rate may be negligible, with differences between the temperature of the egg assuming a value of e=0.95 and that of a blackbody (e=1) below 0.2 °C.

Surface emissivity retrieval from Digital Airborne Imaging Spectrometer data

[1] A study has been carried out on the most recent algorithms for the estimation of land surface emissivity (e) using high-resolution data (Digital Airborne Imaging Spectrometer, DAIS) over the Rhine Valley (France) and Castilla La Mancha (Spain). Three published methods have been applied for extracting absolute spectral emissivity information from images recorded during the DAISEX experiment in 1999. They are NDVI Thresholds Method (NDVITHM), Normalized Emissivity Method (NEM) and Temperature/Emissivity Separation (TES). These lather two methods were originally designed to work over geological surfaces. Five methods have been used for extracting relative spectral emissivity. They are temp…

Near-Real-Time Estimation of Water Vapor Column From MSG-SEVIRI Thermal Infrared Bands: Implications for Land Surface Temperature Retrieval

The Meteosat Second Generation-Spinning Enhanced Visible and Infrared Imager (MSG-SEVIRI) instrument provides observations of half the globe every 15 min, at low spatial resolution. These data are an invaluable tool to observe daily to yearly cycle of land surface temperature (LST), as well as for various early warning systems. However, advanced algorithms for LST estimation requires a previous estimation of the water vapor (WV) column above the observed pixel, for which no instantaneous retrieval methods are yet available, and therefore hinders their implementation in a near-real-time processing chain for MSG-SEVIRI data. This work analyzes three different formulations for such WV retrieva…

Using MSG-Seviri Data to Monitor the Planet in Near Real Time

The SEVIRI (Spinning Enhanced Visible and Infra Red Imager) instrument onboard MSG (Meteosat Second Generation) satellite series provides valuable data for the observation of our planet. We describe here the processing chain implemented at the Global Change Unit of the University of Valencia to provide information such as vegetation index, temperatures of both land and sea, synthetic quicklooks for an easy interpretation of the data as well as fire hotspots. Vegetation index and temperature data are available for download from a dedicated portal updated every 3 hours with the most recent processed data. Additionally, a web page displays this information for a non scientific public in near r…

Spatial analysis of the homogeneity of the land surface temperature in three Spanish test sites

Calibration and validation cal/val are key activities to test the data quality acquired from satellite-based instruments, as well as to report the accuracy of derived products such as the land surface temperature LST. Calibration of thermal infrared TIR data and validation of LST products at low spatial resolution requires the identification of large and homogeneous areas, which is a difficult task. In this work, spatial and temporal homogeneity of LST was analysed over three Spanish regions: the agricultural area of Barrax, Donana National Park, and Cabo de Gata Natural Park. For this purpose, very high spatial resolution approximately 3 m imagery acquired with the Airborne Hyperspectral S…

Recent trends in solar exergy and net radiation at global scale

Abstract The availability during the last decades of remotely sensed images and global climatic data allow us to analyse the “Earth system” as a whole in order to develop concepts for global environmental management. This system can be considered a complex, dissipative, dynamic entity, far from thermodynamic equilibrium ( Schellnhuber, 1999 ). Energy balance has been considered for many decades to understand the functioning of ecosystems, the biosphere or the Earth planet as a whole, but it is also possible to study our planet from a thermodynamic point of view. In this letter we analyse recent trends in solar exergy and net radiation at global scale during the period 1980–2010, distinguish…

Atmospheric water vapour content retrieval from visible and thermal data in the framework of the DAISEX campaigns

In this paper three methods are presented that retrieve the atmospheric water vapour from DAIS (digital airborne imaging spectrometer) data in the framework of the DAISEX (DAIS Experiment) campaigns carried out by ESA (European Space Agency). The three methodologies analysed in the paper are: (i) the ratio technique, in which the water vapour is obtained from visible and near‐infrared bands; (ii) the split‐window technique; and (iii) the split‐window covariance‐variance ratio technique, in which the water vapour content is retrieved from thermal infrared bands. A comparison between the atmospheric water vapour content extracted from the DAIS images using these techniques and that obtained f…

Improved land surface emissivities over agricultural areas using ASTER NDVI

Abstract Land surface emissivity retrieval over agricultural regions is important for energy balance estimations, land cover assessment and other related environmental studies. The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) produces images of sufficient spatial resolution (from 15 m to 90 m) to be of use in agricultural studies, in which fields of crops are too small to be well-resolved by low resolution sensors. The ASTER project generates land surface emissivity images as a Standard Product (AST05) using the Temperature/Emissivity Separation (TES) algorithm. However, the TES algorithm is prone to scaling errors in estimating emissivities for surfaces with low s…

Canopy directional emissivity: Comparison between models

Land surface temperature plays an important role in many environmental studies, as for example the estimation of heat fluxes and evapotranspiration. In order to obtain accurate values of land surface temperature, atmospheric, emissivity and angular effects should be corrected. This paper focuses on the analysis of the angular variation of canopy emissivity, which is an important variable that has to be known to correct surface radiances and obtain surface temperatures. Emissivity is also involved in the atmospheric corrections since it appears in the reflected downwelling atmospheric term. For this purpose, five different methods for simulating directional canopy emissivity have been analyz…

MODIS-Based Monthly LST Products over Amazonia under Different Cloud Mask Schemes

One of the major problems in the monitoring of tropical rainforests using satellite imagery is their persistent cloud coverage. The use of daily observations derived from high temporal resolution sensors, such as Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS), could potentially help to mitigate this issue, increasing the number of clear-sky observations. However, the cloud contamination effect should be removed from these results in order to provide a reliable description of these forests. In this study the available MODIS Land Surface Temperature (LST) products have been reprocessed over the Amazon Basin (10 N–20 S, 80 W–45 W) by introducing different cloud masking schemes. The mont…

Minimum configuration of thermal infrared bands for land surface temperature and emissivity estimation in the context of potential future missions

Abstract A number of applications rely on the availability of high resolution TIR data, both in terms of spatial and temporal resolution, as well as in terms of spectral configuration. A consensus exists among the thermal community regarding the lack of such a kind of data, since only one operational sensor is currently providing multispectral TIR data at high spatial resolution (the case of ASTER, at 90 m spatial resolution and a 16-day revisit time). In this paper we propose a minimum multispectral configuration to allow the retrieval of both land surface temperature (LST) and emissivity ( e ) from thermal infra-red (TIR) data. For this purpose, we propose a minimum configuration based on…

A simple algorithm to estimate evapotranspiration from DAIS data: Application to the DAISEX campaigns

DOI:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2005.03.027; The knowledge of evapotranspiration is of great interest in many applications such as assessing irrigation water use. In this paper, a methodology is presented to estimate evapotranspiration using the surface energy balance model S-SEBI (Simplified Surface Energy Balance Index) and the evaporative fraction. The method is applicable under the assumptions of constant atmospheric conditions and sufficient wet and dry pixels over the image. The model uses remotely sensed parameters such as albedo, MSAVI (Modified Soil Adjusted Vegetation Index) and surface temperature and emissivity images. The methodology has been applied over the Barrax test site, located in…