ASTER Surface Reflectance Data at 15 and 30 Meter Resolution

ASTER L2 Surface Reflectance VNIR and SWIR data provides corrected measures of solar radiation reflected from Earth's surface, processed for atmospheric effects. The dataset is produced by NASA's LPCLOUD and is available via NASA Earthdata Search, with a last documented update in March 2026. It consists of paired HDF-EOS files for VNIR bands at 15-meter resolution and SWIR bands at 30-meter resolution.

Use Cases

• Land cover classification using the VNIR and SWIR spectral bands to distinguish vegetation, soil, and water types.
• Vegetation health and stress assessment by analyzing reflectance in specific infrared wavelengths.
• Geological mapping and mineral identification leveraging the SWIR sensor's sensitivity to rock and soil composition.
• Surface albedo and radiative property studies for climate and energy balance models.

Strengths

• High spatial resolution with VNIR bands at 15 meters and SWIR bands at 30 meters.
• Data is corrected for atmospheric effects and viewing geometry, providing a standardized surface reflectance product.
• Cross-platform presence on NASA Earthdata and Data.gov signals established importance and curation.

Limitations

• Known data anomalies exist for SWIR data acquired from April 2008 onward, including anomalous saturation and striping.
• There were acquisition gaps: VNIR observations were unavailable from November 28, 2024, to January 16, 2025, and TIR observations from November 28, 2024, to April 15, 2025.
• Specific row counts, column names, and dataset size are not provided by any source.

Provenance

Source

NASA LPCLOUD via the Terra ASTER instrument.

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing data processed through the Science Scalable Scripts-based Science Processor for Missions (S4PM) algorithm.

Time Range

Coverage spans from the ASTER mission start date (specifics unknown) through present, with noted acquisition gaps in 2024-2025.

Freshness

2026-03-13 14:18:51.683330

Geography

Global coverage from the Terra satellite.