An open-source albedo-wand for the measurement of sea ice albedo

作者：Christian KATLEIN

摘要：Surface albedo is defined as the ratio of incident and reflected solar irradiance and describes the ability of a surface to reflect, rather than absorb incident solar shortwave radiation. It is thus a crucial parameter in the climate system, particularly in the polar oceans. Sea ice albedo is a main driver for light transmission into the polar oceans and thus has a high impact on ocean warming, ice melting and marine primary production. During spring and summer, sea ice albedo can exhibit a significant spatial variability caused by meltwater accumulations on the ice. While complex and expensive solutions for albedo measurements are already available, we want to present a simple open-source design that allows for affordable mapping of spatially varying surface albedo on sea ice and beyond. Our solution is based on off-the-shelf components, such as an Arduino microcontroller integrating affordable light sensors, a GPS unit, data recording on memory card and data display into a simple field strengthened unit. We provide example data from two Arctic field deployments showing the capabilities and limitations of this system.

发文机构：Alfred-Wegener-Institut Takuvik Joint International Laboratory

关键词：seaICEALBEDOspatialVARIABILITYmappingGPSOPEN-SOURCE

分类号： P[天文地球]