The Satellite Application Facility for Land Surface Analysis

Information on land surface properties finds applications in a range of areas related to weather forecasting, environmental research, hazard management and climate monitoring. Remotely sensed observations yield the only means of supplying land surface information with adequate time sampling and a wide spatial coverage. The aim of the Satellite Application Facility for Land Surface Analysis (Land-SAF) is to take full advantage of remotely sensed data to support land, land-atmosphere and biosphere applications, with emphasis on the development and implementation of algorithms that allow operational use of data from European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) sensors. This article provides an overview of the Land-SAF, with brief descriptions of algorithms and validation results. The set of parameters currently estimated and disseminated by the Land-SAF consists of three main groups: (i) the surface radiation budget, including albedo, land surface temperature, and downward short- and longwave fluxes; (ii) the surface water budget (snow cover and evapotranspiration); and (iii) vegetation and wild-fire parameters.