Publications

Smalley, KM; Lebsocka, MD (2023). Corrections for Geostationary Cloud Liquid Water Path Using Microwave Imagery. JOURNAL OF ATMOSPHERIC AND OCEANIC TECHNOLOGY, 40(9), 1049-1061.

Abstract
Geostationary observations provide measurements of the cloud liquid water path (LWP), permitting con-tinuous observation of cloud evolution throughout the daylit portion of the diurnal cycle. Relative to LWP derived from microwave imagery, these observations have biases related to scattering geometry, which systematically varies throughout the day. Therefore, we have developed a set of bias corrections using microwave LWP for the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-16 and-17 (GOES-16 and GOES-17) observations of LWP derived from retrieved cloud-optical properties. The bias corrections are defined based on scattering geometry (solar zenith, sensor zenith, and relative azimuth) and low cloud fraction. We demonstrate that over the low-cloud regions of the northeast and southeast Pacific, these bias corrections drastically improve the characteristics of the retrieved LWP, including its regional distribution, diurnal varia-tion, and evolution along short-time-scale Lagrangian trajectories.

DOI:
10.1175/JTECH-D-23-0030.1

ISSN:
1520-0426