Comparing Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 top of atmosphere and surface reflectance in high latitude regions: case study in Alaska

Abstract

Combining Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 images is an effective approach to obtain high spatiotemporal resolution data for Earth observation and remote sensing modeling. The differences between Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 products, such as the reflectance at the top of atmosphere (TOA) and land surface, should be compared and evaluated to make sure they are spectrally consistent. Their consistency has been evaluated and the differences have been empirically corrected at mid-low latitudes, but in high latitude areas with a higher solar zenith angle (SZA), the similar work has not been explored. In this study, Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 TOA and surface reflectance in Alaska as well as some surface parameters, such as the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and normalized difference snow index (NDSI), were compared using the massive data distributed on Google earth engine (GEE) online platform, and their consistency was evaluated and the uncertainty was analyzed. Some empirical models were suggested to convert Sentinel-2 products to be consistent with Landsat-8 products at all bands. The results show that TOA reflectance is more consistent than surface reflectance in Alaska. This study suggests that the consistency between Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 at high latitudes should be paid more attention because their consistency is lower than that at mid-low latitudes.