Tuesday, 6 April 1999
Information on radiative fluxes is required for advancing the
understanding of the role of water in land-atmosphere
interactions. Over extanded areas, only satellites can provide the
necessary coverage. In a collaborative effort between the University of Maryland,
NOAA/NESDIS, and NCEP, capabilities have been developed to infer this
information from the GOES satellites over the United States, in support of the GEWEX
Continental-scale International Project (GCIP). Presently, radiative
fluxes are derived in real time, and provided to the public via the Web.
Similar information is needed in support of the hydrological modeling efforts
of the LBA project. New activities are underway to improve capabilities
to derive surface radiative fluxes in support of LBA, by incorporating
unique conditions that exist over the Amazon Basin, in particular, in respect
to deforestation and biomass burning; implement these improved
methodologies at spatial and temporal scales of interest to the LBA
hydrological and ecological modeling community. The "ground truth" on
surface radiative fluxes for validation will be collected by independent
investigators and used to test the algorithms in this unique environment.
Progress made will be discussed and potentials for transferability
studies between GCIP and LBA will be explored.
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