A Comparison of GOES Sounder– and Cloud Lidar- and Radar-Retrieved Cloud-Top Heights

Abstract

An assessment of the performance of the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) sounder cloud-top pressure product is presented. GOES sounder cloud-top-height data were compared with values derived from a consensus cloud boundary dataset that utilizes data from a cloud lidar and a cloud radar located at the U.S. Department of Energy?s (DOE?s) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program?s Cloud and Radiation Test Bed (CART) site in Lamont, Oklahoma. Comparisons were performed from April 2000 to March 2002. A temporal filtering process was applied to the cloud lidar and cloud radar output so that a representative picture of the cloud field on the same spatial scale of the GOES sounder could be derived. Comparisons between the GOES sounder and ground-based cloud boundary measurements yielded a mean difference of 1772 m and a standard deviation of 1733 m. The difference between GOES cloud-top-height and ground-based retrievals is within ±500 m for 22% of the retrievals and within ±1500 m for 56% of the retrievals. These results are comparable to findings in similar studies that utilized the MODIS Airborne Simulator.