SATELLITE OBSERVATION OF SURFACE ALBEDO OVER THE QINGHAI-XIZANG PLATEAU REGION

A method has been developed to determine the surface albedo over the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau region from NOAA polar orbiter AVHRR (Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer) data. The empirical relationship between clear-sky planetary and surface albedos is established the basis of surface global radiation measurements and the specified ratio between atmospheric reflection and absoption of solar radiation. The method is applied to the Qinghai-Xizang region with several measurements during the period of Sep. to Nov., 1985. A comparison is presented between the estimated surface albedos and that of surface observation. The results show that the presented method is suitable to detecting the spatial and temporal variation of surface albedo and is relevant for climatological studies. The possible error sources and improvements are discussed as well.