Suomi NPP VIIRS Reflective Solar Bands Operational Calibration Reprocessing

Abstract

Radiometric calibration coefficients for the VIIRS (Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) reflective solar bands have been reprocessed from the beginning of the Suomi NPP (National Polar-orbiting Partnership) mission until present. An automated calibration procedure, implemented in the NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) JPSS (Joint Polar Satellite System) operational data production system, was applied to reprocess onboard solar calibration data and solar diffuser degradation measurements. The latest processing parameters from the operational system were used to include corrected solar vectors, optimized directional dependence of attenuation screens transmittance and solar diffuser reflectance, updated prelaunch calibration coefficients without an offset term, and optimized Robust Holt-Winters filter parameters. The parameters were consistently used to generate a complete set of the radiometric calibration coefficients for the entire duration of the Suomi NPP mission. The reprocessing has demonstrated that the automated calibration procedure can be successfully applied to all solar measurements acquired from the beginning of the mission until the full deployment of the automated procedure in the operational processing system. The reprocessed calibration coefficients can be further used to reprocess VIIRS SDR (Sensor Data Record) and other data products. The reprocessing has also demonstrated how the automated calibration procedure can be used during activation of the VIIRS instruments on the future JPSS satellites.

Evaluation of NOAA-20 VIIRS Reflective Solar Bands Early On-Orbit Performance Using Daily Deep Convective Clouds Recent Improvements

“…The on-orbit calibration of NOAA operational S-NPP VIIRS RSBs has relied on an automated calibration procedure (RSBAutoCal) since December 2015, with on-orbit calibration factors (F-factor) updated per orbit, i.e. 14 times per day [12,13]. The calibration of S-NPP RSBs during the study period has been stable based on our monitoring results , except for two short-term anomalies: (1) M4/M5 calibration anomaly due to the missing of calibration data (February 19-25, 2018), and (2) solar diffuser (SD) digital count change, started from February 24, 2019.…”

An Overall Assessment of JPSS-2 VIIRS Radiometric Performance Based on Pre-Launch Testing

“…Additionally, a long wavelength spectral blocking filter was placed in the optical path during the M1-M3 testing to eliminate near infrared out-of-band (OOB) contributions. Using a Fourier series, the polarization sensitivity was derived for all VisNIR bands, detectors, HAM sides and eleven scan angles (−55, −45, −37, −30, −20, −15, −8, 4,22,45,55). Only the zeroth and second order terms derived from the Fourier transform have non-negligible values, which is an indication of the high quality polarization measurements.…”

“…This VIIRS instrument is the third flight unit of its series and its design is very similar to the previous missions, the Suomi-National Polar-Orbiting Partnership (SNPP) and JPSS-1 which were launched on 28 October 2011 and 18 November 2017, respectively. Both SNPP and JPSS-1 VIIRS have been collecting high quality remote sensing data [1][2][3][4] and have contributed not only to the continuity of the climate data record initiated by other spaceborne Earth observing instruments but have also supported many crucial environmental, economic and scientific applications [5][6][7][8]. In addition to J2, the JPSS program is expected to launch two more VIIRS instruments in the next decade, JPSS-3 (J3) and JPSS-4 (J4).…”

An Overall Assessment of JPSS-2 VIIRS Radiometric Performance Based on Pre-launch Testing

“…This VIIRS instrument is the third flight unit of its series, and its design is very similar to the previous missions, the Suomi-National Polar-Orbiting Partnership (SNPP) and JPSS-1 which were launched on October 28, 2011 and November 18, 2017, respectively. Both SNPP and JPSS-1 VIIRS have been collecting high quality remote sensing data [1][2][3][4], and have contributed not only to the continuity of the climate data record initiated by other spaceborne Earth observing instruments, but have also supported many crucial environmental, economic and scientific applications [5][6][7][8]. In addition to J2, the JPSS program is expected to launch two more VIIRS instruments in the next decade, JPSS-3 (J3) and JPSS-4 (J4).…”