The photometric properties of natural snow and of snow-covered planets

Using the white light measurements of Knowles Middleton and Mungall (1952), the Minnaert constants k and B₀ are derived for six types of snow surfaces for phase angles up to 80°. The conclusion is that snow is in general a quasi-Lambert scatterer (k = 1.04?1.35). Even in an extreme case of specular reflection (a “glazed rain crust”), k is less than 2 at these phase angles. The range in k and B₀ suggested by these data are then used to estimate some fundamental photometric parameters of smooth snow-covered planets: geometric albedos, phase integrals, Bond albedos, and phase coefficients.