CERES and GEO-Enhanced TOA, Within-Atmosphere and Surface Fluxes, Clouds and Aerosols 1-Ho

CERES SYN1deg Edition4B provides hourly top-of-atmosphere, within-atmosphere, and surface radiative fluxes alongside cloud and aerosol properties. The data is collected by multiple instruments on NASA's Terra, Aqua, and NOAA-20 satellites and enhanced with geostationary satellite observations. It is produced by NASA's Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) using the Langley Fu-Liou radiative transfer model.

Use Cases

• Modeling Earth's radiative energy budget based on computed all-sky and clear-sky fluxes.
• Analyzing cloud property variability based on MODIS and geostationary-derived cloud data.
• Studying aerosol impacts on atmospheric radiation based on pristine and aerosol-adjusted flux conditions.
• Validating climate models based on temporally interpolated, CERES-calibrated TOA fluxes.
• Investigating diurnal cycles of radiation based on 1-hourly GEO-enhanced sampling.

Strengths

• Data integrates observations from multiple satellite platforms (Terra, Aqua, NOAA-20) and instruments (CERES, MODIS, VIIRS).
• Fluxes are provided for multiple conditions (all-sky, clear-sky, pristine, all-sky without aerosols) in longwave, shortwave, and window regions.
• Product uses a normalization technique to ensure consistency between CERES and geostationary satellite TOA fluxes.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count and dataset size are unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing data from CERES, MODIS, and VIIRS instruments, processed with the Langley Fu-Liou radiative transfer model.

Freshness

Data collection is ongoing; last metadata update was 2026-03-13.

Geography

Global coverage on a 1-degree regional spatial scale.