Evaluation of the ERA5 Sea Surface Skin Temperature with Remotely-Sensed Shipborne Marine-Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer Data

Remote Sensing

Peter Minnett¹  Bingkun Luo¹ 

[1] Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, University of Miami, 4600 Rickenbacker Causeway, Miami, FL 33149, USA;

关键词: ERA5;    evaluation;    sea surface skin temperature;    M-AERI;   

DOI  :  10.3390/rs12111873

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

Sea surface temperature is very important in weather and ocean forecasting, and studying the ocean, atmosphere and climate system. Measuring the sea surface skin temperature (SST_skin) with infrared radiometers onboard earth observation satellites and shipboard instruments is a mature subject spanning several decades. Reanalysis model output SST_skin, such as from the newly released ERA5, is very widely used and has been applied for monitoring climate change, weather prediction research, and other commercial applications. The ERA5 output SST_skin data must be rigorously evaluated to meet the stringent accuracy requirements for climate research. This study aims to estimate the accuracy of the ERA5 SST_skin fields and provide an associated error estimate by using measurements from accurate shipboard infrared radiometers: the Marine-Atmosphere Emitted Radiance Interferometers (M-AERIs). Overall, the ERA5 SST_skin has high correlation with ship-based radiometric measurements, with an average difference of~0.2 K with a Pearson correlation coefficient (R) of 0.993. Parts of the discrepancies are related to dust aerosols and variability in air-sea temperature differences. The downward radiative flux due to dust aerosols leads to significant SST_skin differences for ERA5. The SST_skin differences are greater with the large, positive air–sea temperature differences. This study provides suggestions for the applicability of ERA5 SST_skin fields in a selection of research applications.

【 授权许可】

Unknown