GHRSST GOES-17 ABI L3C: Hourly Sea Surface Temperature Grids for the Americas

13 hourly granules per day from 20UTC to 08UTC, with a daily data volume of 0.1GB. This dataset provides gridded sea surface temperature (SST) measurements from the GOES-17 satellite's Advanced Baseline Imager, processed by NOAA/STAR's ACSPO system and compliant with GHRSST GDS2 specifications. The data is produced by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and was last updated in March 2026.

Use Cases

• Modeling diurnal warming cycles based on the 1-hour temporal resolution.
• Validating satellite SST retrievals using the reported bias and standard deviation error statistics per pixel.
• Analyzing clear-sky ocean conditions using the integrated ACSPO clear-sky mask and other flag layers.
• Assessing SST anomalies by comparing the ACSPO SST minus reference layer against a high-resolution L4 analysis.

Strengths

• Provides 13 validated hourly data granules per day, offering a specific temporal observation window.
• Includes multiple ancillary data layers such as wind speed, clear-sky masks, and pixel-level error statistics.
• Compliant with the GHRSST Data Specification version 2 (GDS2), suggesting a standardized format.

Limitations

• Data coverage is interrupted daily from 09UTC to 19UTC due to the satellite's loop heat pipe issue.
• SSTs over internal waters like lakes and rivers may not be adequately validated due to a lack of in situ data.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration, NOAA/STAR ACSPO system.

Collection Method

Gridded (Level 3 Collated) product derived from the ACSPO G17/ABI L2P satellite retrievals.

Time Range

Hourly observations from 20UTC to 08UTC daily.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 02:32:11.980493; freshness should be verified.

Geography

America region, with valid SSTs reported over oceans, seas, lakes, and rivers.