Evaluation of AMSR2 and Modis Land Surface Temperature Using Ground Measurements in Heihe River Basin

Abstract

Land Surface Temperature (LST) is an important input parameter for many land surface models. The accuracy of satellite LST products directly affect its application; therefore, it is necessary to evaluate LST products. In this study, two satellite remotely sensed LST products, i.e. AMSR2 LST and MODIS LST, were evaluated against the in-situ LSTs at 17 ground sites in Heihe River Basin in 2014. Results show that both AMSR2 and MODIS LSTs have good correlations with the in-situ LST, with R2 from 0.80 to 0.98 except at AR2 site at daytime. However, both of these two products have large systematic errors compared with the in-situ LST. The possible main reason is the scale mismatch between the FOV of the longwave radiometer and the AMSR2 and MODIS pixels.