go to TEMIS Home Page

Aerosol Direct Radiative Effect over clouds from SCIAMACHY

go to TEMIS Home Page
 
 
 


 
SCIAMACHY aerosol DRE data over clouds explanation  
 

 

Main page Aerosol DRE  
 


 
 
 
The Aerosol Direct Radiative Effect (DRE) over clouds was computed using SCIAMACHY reflectances for all cloud scenes
in an area over the south-east Atlantic (20°W - 10°E, 20°S - 10°N) from 2006 to 2009, during the months
June - September. This is a period of massive vegetation burning in southern Africa during the dry season
and often smoke plumes can be observed drifting over the Atlantic ocean. The aerosol DRE from SCIAMACHY indicates
the warming effect of the smoke when it overlies clouds due to absorption of sunlight. This is measured in Watts per
square meter (Wm-2). The images show an overview of the warming effect on a particular day. The SCIAMACHY
aerosol DRE is overplotted over MODIS RGB showing clouds. However, the MODIS instrument passes over this area in the
afternoon (around 13.00-14.00 UTC), while SCIAMACHY passes over in the morning (around 10.30 UTC), so the image and the
data were acquired about 3.5 hours apart. MODIS was used, to compare the data more easily to the OMI data here.
The exact times are indicated in the image.
An example of SCIAMACHY DRE over clouds acquired by MERIS (which was on EnviSat together with SCIAMACHY,
and thus viewed the area at the same time) can be seen here
 
 
Below the main features in the aerosol DRE over clouds images are explained.

SCIAMACHY aerosol DRE for Dummies

 
 
Return to the SCIAMACHY aerosol DRE page.