Comparison of TOA fluxes from FLASHFlux and CERES SSF 1Deg Lite

Abstract: Top of atmosphere (TOA) shortwave (SW) and longwave (LW) radiative fluxes from Fast Longwave and Shortwave Radiative Fluxes (FLASHFlux) and a special gridded product from Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy System (called CERES SSF 1Deg Lite) are now available for the overlapping period covering all of 2007. CERES SSF 1Deg Lite is a new product that has been introduced to give an early look into CERES Edition 3 products. CERES SSF 1Deg Lite is a gridded, monthly mean product from the Terra satellite. It uses Edition 3 instrument calibration and Edition 2 algorithms to calculate TOA fluxes. FLASHFlux was created to produce surface and TOA fluxes from CERES measurements within one week of satellite observations. FLASHFlux uses Edition 2 instrument calibrations and Edition 2 algorithms with input from both Aqua and Terra satellites and produces gridded output for every day. Differences in processing give rise to noticeable differences in the resulting monthly mean results. This work will explore the similarities and differences in monthly mean TOA fluxes from these two datasets.