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dc.contributor.author
Roesch, Andreas
dc.contributor.author
Wild, Martin
dc.contributor.author
Ohmura, Atsumu
dc.contributor.author
Dutton, E.G.
dc.contributor.author
Long, C.N.
dc.contributor.author
Zhang, Taiping
dc.date.accessioned
2019-09-06T16:20:06Z
dc.date.available
2017-06-09T09:51:37Z
dc.date.available
2019-09-06T16:20:06Z
dc.date.issued
2011
dc.identifier.issn
1867-1381
dc.identifier.issn
1867-8548
dc.identifier.other
10.5194/amt-4-339-2011
en_US
dc.identifier.uri
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/31394
dc.identifier.doi
10.3929/ethz-b-000031394
dc.description.abstract
The integrity of the Baseline Surface Radiation Network (BSRN) radiation monthly averages are assessed by investigating the impact on monthly means due to the frequency of data gaps caused by missing or discarded high time resolution data. The monthly statistics, especially means, are considered to be important and useful values for climate research, model performance evaluations and for assessing the quality of satellite (time- and space-averaged) data products. The study investigates the spread in different algorithms that have been applied for the computation of monthly means from 1-min values. The paper reveals that the computation of monthly means from 1-min observations distinctly depends on the method utilized to account for the missing data. The intra-method difference generally increases with an increasing fraction of missing data. We found that a substantial fraction of the radiation fluxes observed at BSRN sites is either missing or flagged as questionable. The percentage of missing data is 4.4%, 13.0%, and 6.5% for global radiation, direct shortwave radiation, and downwelling longwave radiation, respectively. Most flagged data in the shortwave are due to nighttime instrumental noise and can reasonably be set to zero after correcting for thermal offsets in the daytime data. The study demonstrates that the handling of flagged data clearly impacts on monthly mean estimates obtained with different methods. We showed that the spread of monthly shortwave fluxes is generally clearly higher than for downwelling longwave radiation. Overall, BSRN observations provide sufficient accuracy and completeness for reliable estimates of monthly mean values. However, the value of future data could be further increased by reducing the frequency of data gaps and the number of outliers. It is shown that two independent methods for accounting for the diurnal and seasonal variations in the missing data permit consistent monthly means to within less than 1 W m−2 in most cases. The authors suggest using a standardized method for the computation of monthly means which addresses diurnal variations in the missing data in order to avoid a mismatch of future published monthly mean radiation fluxes from BSRN. The application of robust statistics would probably lead to less biased results for data records with frequent gaps and/or flagged data and outliers. The currently applied empirical methods should, therefore, be completed by the development of robust methods.
en_US
dc.format
application/pdf
en_US
dc.language.iso
en
en_US
dc.publisher
Copernicus
en_US
dc.rights.uri
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
dc.title
Assessment of BSRN radiation records for the computation of monthly means
en_US
dc.type
Journal Article
dc.rights.license
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported
dc.date.published
2011-02-23
ethz.journal.title
Atmospheric Measurement Techniques
ethz.journal.volume
4
en_US
ethz.journal.issue
2
en_US
ethz.journal.abbreviated
Atmos. meas. tech.
ethz.pages.start
339
en_US
ethz.pages.end
354
en_US
ethz.version.deposit
publishedVersion
en_US
ethz.notes
Received 24 June 2010, Published in Atmos. Meas. Tech. Discuss., 18 October 2010, Revised 28 January 2011, Accepted 31 January 2011, Published 23 February 2011.
en_US
ethz.identifier.wos
ethz.publication.place
Göttingen
en_US
ethz.publication.status
published
en_US
ethz.relation.isPreviousVersionOf
10.5194/amt-4-973-2011
ethz.date.deposited
2017-06-09T09:52:11Z
ethz.source
ECIT
ethz.identifier.importid
imp59364dbeb13d131586
ethz.ecitpid
pub:51801
ethz.eth
yes
en_US
ethz.availability
Open access
en_US
ethz.rosetta.installDate
2017-07-12T17:38:50Z
ethz.rosetta.lastUpdated
2019-09-06T16:20:49Z
ethz.rosetta.versionExported
true
ethz.COinS
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