Interannual Variations of TOA Albedo over the Arctic, Antarctic and Tibetan Plateau in 2000–2019 ...

• Main Authors: Wu, Dong L., Lee, Jae, Kim, Kyu-Myong, Lim, Young-Kwon
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI 2020
• Subjects: Antarctic; Arctic; The Antarctic; albedo; Antarc*; Subarctic
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.13016/m24thm-tunp; https://mdsoar.org/handle/11603/24378

Recent changes in Earth’s climate system have significantly affected the radiation budget and its year-to-year variations at top of the atmosphere (TOA). Observing high-latitude TOA fluxes is still challenging from space, because spatial inhomogeneity of surface/atmospheric radiative processes and spectral variability can reflect sunlight very differently. In this study we analyze the 20-year TOA flux and albedo data from CERES and MISR over the Arctic, the Antarctic, and Tibetan Plateau (TP), and found overall great consistency in the TOA albedo trend and interannual variations. The observations reveal a lagged correlation between the Arctic and subarctic albedo fluctuations. The observed year-to-year variations are further used to evaluate the reanalysis data, which exhibit substantial shortcomings in representing the polar TOA flux variability. The observed Arctic flux variations are highly correlated with cloud fraction (CF), except in the regions where CF > 90% or where the surface is covered by ice. ...