Evaluation of Six High-Resolution Satellite and Ground-Based Precipitation Products over Malaysia

Remote Sensing

Mou Leong Tan³  Ab Latif Ibrahim³  Zheng Duan²  Arthur P Cracknell⁴  Vincent Chaplot⁵  Xin Li¹  Yuei-An Liou¹  Qinhuo Liu¹ 

[1]id="af1-remotesensing-07-01504">1Institute of Geospatial Science and Technology (INSTeG), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 UTM Skudai, Johor Bahru, Malays

[2]Delft University of Technology, Stevinweg 1, 2628 CN Delft, The Netherlands

[3] E-Mail:

[4]Institute of Geospatial Science and Technology (INSTeG), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 UTM Skudai, Johor Bahru, Malaysia

[5]School of Engineering, Physics and Mathematics, University of Dundee, Dundee DDI 4HN, UK

[6] E-Mail:

[7]Laboratoire d'Océanographie et du Climat (LOCEAN), UMR 7159 CNRS/IRD/UPMC/MNHN, boîte 100, 4, place Jussieu, 75252 Paris Cedex 05, France

[8] E-Mail:

关键词: TRMM;    GPCP;    APHRODITE;    PERSIANN;    CMORPH;    validation;    rainfall;    Southeast Asia;    Asia Maritime Continent monsoon;    Malaysia;   

DOI  :  10.3390/rs70201504

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

Satellite precipitation products (SPPs) potentially constitute an alternative to sparse rain gauge networks for assessing the spatial distribution of precipitation. However, applications of these products are still limited due to the lack of robust quality assessment. This study compares daily, monthly, seasonal, and annual rainfall amount at 342 rain gauges over Malaysia to estimations using five SPPs (3B42RT, 3B42V7, GPCP-1DD, PERSIANN-CDR, and CMORPH) and a ground-based precipitation product (APHRODITE). The performance of the precipitation products was evaluated from 2003 to 2007 using continuous (RMSE, R², ME, MAE, and RB) and categorical (ACC, POD, FAR, CSI, and HSS) statistical approaches. Overall, 3B42V7 and APHRODITE performed the best, while the worst performance was shown by GPCP-1DD. 3B42RT, 3B42V7, and PERSIANN-CDR slightly overestimated observed precipitation by 2%, 4.7%, and 2.1%, respectively. By contrast, APHRODITE and CMORPH significantly underestimated precipitations by 19.7% and 13.2%, respectively, whereas GPCP-1DD only slightly underestimated by 2.8%. All six precipitation products performed better in the northeast monsoon than in the southwest monsoon. The better performances occurred in eastern and southern Peninsular Malaysia and in the north of East Malaysia, which receives higher rainfall during the northeast monsoon, whereas poor performances occurred in the western and dryer Peninsular Malaysia. All precipitation products underestimated the no/tiny (<1 mm/day) and extreme (≥20 mm/day) rainfall events, while they overestimated low (1–20 mm/day) rainfall events. 3B42RT and 3B42V7 showed the best ability to detect precipitation amounts with the highest HSS value (0.36). Precipitations during flood events such as those which occurred in late 2006 and early 2007 were estimated the best by 3B42RT and 3B42V7, as shown by an R² value ranging from 0.49 to 0.88 and 0.52 to 0.86, respectively. These results on SPPs’ uncertainties and their potential controls might allow sensor and algorithm developers to deliver better products for improved rainfall estimation and thus improved water management.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.