10 Years of MODIS Cloud Products

Ten years of MODIS data are now available to construct well-characterized and understood cloud climatologies. The MODIS instruments and their satellite orbit characteristics have remained extremely stable throughout the data record for both Terra and Aqua. This stability allows for simultaneous long-term, global analyses of the state of and variability in the cloud field and regional characterization of cloud properties. We are also able to assess and attribute the sources of known systematic errors in the global cloud field and provide quantitative error analysis. The combination of this error analyses and the high spectral and spatial resolution instrument data record allow for a better constrained view of the global cloud field for purposes of studying the earth radiation budget and water cycle.

The vertical and horizontal distribution of clouds is the most fundamental assessment that can be made of the global cloud field. Yet, this assessment contains a significant amount of uncertainty both in its measurement and its interpretation. We will focus on presenting the MODIS cloud data record for both global long-term record and for various local-to-regional scale cloud properties along with their associated error analyses. We will also present the mean state and variability in the global cloud field and attribute dominate components of the variability to their sources.