Validation of POLDER-3/GRASP aerosol products using AERONET measurements over China. (15th October 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Tan, Yunhui; Li, Enguang; Zhang, Zhaoyang; Lin, Xingwen; Chi, Yonggang; Zhou, Lei; Wu, Chaofan; Wang, Quan
• Is Part Of: Atmospheric environment. Volume 215(2019)
• Publication Date: 2019-10-15
• Subjects: POLDER-3/GRASP aerosol product -- AERONET -- Validation -- China; Air -- Pollution -- Periodicals; Air -- Pollution -- Meteorological aspects -- Periodicals; 551.51
• DOI: 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2019.116893
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1352-2310

Abstract

Abstract: The third generation of Polarization and Directionality of Earth Reflectance instrument (POLDER-3) aerosol products provide aerosol optical depth (AOD), fine aerosol optical depth (AODF), coarse aerosol optical depth (AODC), absorbed aerosol optical depth (AAOD), the Ångström exponent (AE), complex refractive index (CRI, CRI = n + iκ) and single scattering albedo (SSA). These properties are essential for understanding the effects of aerosol on climate changes. However, the performance of those aerosol optical properties has not been validated in China. This study provides the first validation of all the POLDER-3/GRASP aerosol optical properties using ground measurements at 15 AErosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) stations over China. The comparison shows that the correlation coefficient is 0.9530/0.9587/0.6371/0.5566/0.09/0.5835/0.6834 between POLDER-3/GRASP AOD/AODF/AAOD/AODC/n/κ/SSA and that of AERONET stations. There are less than 49.9%/85.9%/54.4% of the AOD/AODF/AODC values falling within the Expected Error (EE, ± (0.05 + 15%)) envelopes. The performance of POLDER-3 AOD is close to the MODIS and VIIRS dark-target (DT) AOD. The monthly POLDER-3 AOD are overestimated and SSA are underestimated in SACOL and Xianghe. Different land cover types affect the AODC retrieval significantly and high aerosol loading (AOD > 1) will cause the underestimation of AOD. These results indicate that the POLDER-3 aerosol product is more sensitive to fine aerosol type. Highlights: The performance of POLDER-3/GRASP aerosol products was validated firstly in China. Temporal trend of POLDER-3/GRASP AOD agree well with AERONET AOD. The POLDER-3/GRASP AODC performs well in urban region. The mean monthly POLDER-3/GRASP SSA is underestimated in all matched months.