CERES Fast Longwave And Shorthwave Radiative Flux (FLASHFlux) Version4A

The agricultural, renewable energy management, and science communities need global surface and top-of-atmosphere (TOA) radiative fluxes on a near real-time basis. The Clouds and Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) FLASHFlux (Fast Longwave and SHortwave radiative Flux) data products address this need by enhancing the speed of CERES processing using simplified calibration and averaging techniques and fast radiation parameterizations to produce fluxes within a week of satellite observations. The CERES FLASHFlux provides two data products: 1) an hourly Level 2 Single Scanner Footprint (SSF) data separately for Aqua and Terra observation, and 2) a daily Level 3 Time Interpolated and Spatially Averaged (TISA) 1^o x 1^o gridded data that combines Aqua and Terra observations.

The CERES FLASHFlux data product is being promoted to Version4A. Updates to FLASHFlux Version4A include a new version of the Meteorology from the Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) GEOS 5.12.4 data product, a new cloud retrieval algorithm, and SORCE incoming Total Solar Irradiance. We inter-compared FLASHFlux Version4A, FLASHFlux Version3B, and CERES EBAF (Energy Balanced and Filled) Top-of-Atmosphere fluxes to evaluate these improvements. We also analyze the impact of the new inputs and cloud algorithm to the surface shortwave and longwave radiative fluxes using ground sites measurement provided by CAVE (CERES/ARM Validation Experiment).