Earth  ID: 3090

Average Total-sky Albedo (WMS)

Visualizations by Horace Mitchell Released on February 1, 2005
The Earth's climate is determined by energy transfer from the sun to the Earth's land, oceans, and atmosphere. As the Earth rotates, the sun lights up only part of the Earth at a time, and some of that incoming solar energy is reflected and some is absorbed, depending on type of area it lights. The average amount of reflection and absorption is critical to the climate, because the absorbed energy heats up the Earth until it is radiated away as thermal radiation. This animation shows the monthly average albedo from July, 2002 through June, 2004 as measured by the CERES instrument. This is the fraction of the incoming solar radiation that is reflected back into space by regions of the Earth. The regions of highest albedo are regions of snow and ice, followed by desert regions and regions where there is significant cloud cover during the year. Oceans have the lowest albedo. It is not possible to measure the albedo during the winter months at the poles, since there is no incoming solar radiation during these times.
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This animation shows the monthly average total-sky albedo from CERES for July 2002 through June 2004.

This product is available through our Web Map Service.
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This is the legend for the total-sky albedo animation, indicating the fraction of solar radiation reflected.

For More Information

http://asd-www.larc.nasa.gov/ceres/ASDceres.html

Visualization Credits

Horace Mitchell (NASA/GSFC): Lead Animator
Eric Sokolowsky (GST): Animator
Bruce A. Wielicki (NASA/LaRC): Scientist
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

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https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/3090

Data Used:
Aqua/CERES/Albedo
2002/07/01-2004/06/30
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Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

Dates of Data Used:
2002/07/01-2004/06/30

This item is part of this series:
WMS

Keywords:
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Atmosphere >> Atmospheric Radiation >> Albedo
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Cryosphere >> Snow/Ice >> Albedo
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Hydrosphere >> Snow/Ice >> Albedo
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Land Surface >> Surface Radiative Properties >> Albedo
SVS >> CERES
NASA Science >> Earth

GCMD keywords can be found on the Internet with the following citation: Olsen, L.M., G. Major, K. Shein, J. Scialdone, S. Ritz, T. Stevens, M. Morahan, A. Aleman, R. Vogel, S. Leicester, H. Weir, M. Meaux, S. Grebas, C.Solomon, M. Holland, T. Northcutt, R. A. Restrepo, R. Bilodeau, 2013. NASA/Global Change Master Directory (GCMD) Earth Science Keywords. Version 8.0.0.0.0