
GOES-17 Releases ‘First Light’ Imagery from Its Advanced Baseline Imager - el_duderino
https://www.nesdis.noaa.gov/content/goes-17-releases-%E2%80%98first-light%E2%80%99-imagery-its-advanced-baseline-imager-abi
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caterama
GOES-16 and GOES-17 are supposed to be identical, barring the cooling issue.
Check out these fascinating loop-of-the-days from GOES-16. I'm sure they will
be adding GOES-17 soon as well.

[http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/ramsdis/online/loop_of_the_d...](http://rammb.cira.colostate.edu/ramsdis/online/loop_of_the_day/)

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zamalek
I had never noticed just how much cloud-cover there is globally. Wondering if
it was just an artifact if the false coloring, I did a search. Turns out that
that level of cloud-cover is normal[1]. Fascinating.

[1]:
[https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/GlobalMaps/view.php?d1=MOD...](https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/GlobalMaps/view.php?d1=MODAL2_M_CLD_FR)

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SiempreViernes
One of the primary science justifications for DSCOVR is its ability to measure
the total combined reflectivity of Earth, dynamic cloud cover and all.

This albedo as it’s called is very important for climate science, and
opposition to what climate science tells us about the world was an important
part of the Bush administration deciding to not actually launch the finished
satellite (the main reason being the overall idea was by Al Gore)[1]

All this is to say: check out these real images of the entire Earth
[https://epic.gsfc.nasa.gov/](https://epic.gsfc.nasa.gov/)

[1]: [https://www.airspacemag.com/space/al-gores-
satellite-1809521...](https://www.airspacemag.com/space/al-gores-
satellite-180952132/)

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zamalek
> albedo

That's exactly why I found this so fascinating. I know that the ice caps are
extremely important for slowing climate change (due to their albedo, being
completely white). I had no idea that clouds were so prevalent. My initial
thoughts on seeing that image were "wow, that's a lot of albedo, has climate
change improved cloud coverage?" A directly counteracting force to the most
dangerous GHG (water vapor). Turns out maybe not? We don't have industrial age
data in this, so we can't tell for certain - but maybe (likely not) there is a
glimmer of hope.

Thanks for the additional information, either way.

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kaybe
Clouds work both ways: They reflect short-wave visible radiation back into
space, but they also send long-wave thermal radiation back to the ground and
keep it warmer (compare your experience with cloudless nights to ones with
clouds).

So far it looks like high clouds have a cooling effect and low clouds have a
warming effect. We are not sure yet which clouds will increase more (this may
not be up-to-date or might be known soon) but we expect more clouds in general
in a warmer climate.

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__x0x__
You have it backwards; the cirriform clouds are mostly transparent to visible
but absorb and re-emit IR effectively (cloud greenhouse effect). Low clouds
tend to have a very high albedo, hence effectively reflect incoming solar
radiation, like ice/snow.

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kaybe
Indeed, thanks for the correction!

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inamberclad
Unfortunately, the cooling system on this instrument isn't working as
expected. We've got the visible spectrum, but not some of the long infrared
wavelengths.

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raverbashing
I wonder if this can be mitigated with software processing

Still, I wonder what kind of information can be gathered by long infrared
here. Heat reflection/balance on the Earth? Climate Change related info?

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SiempreViernes
Most of the goes-17 bands are in the ir, 14 out of 16, and their nicknames in
this table gives some clue as to their use:
[https://www.goes-r.gov/education/ABI-bands-quick-
info.html](https://www.goes-r.gov/education/ABI-bands-quick-info.html)

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raverbashing
That's very informative, thanks!

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craftandhustle
Gorgeous.

And, as a curious artist— is the 'GeoColor' image composited by the satellite
camera or done manually afterward in post? Mostly, I'd love to see raw stills
of the different bands they reference in the image (like the infrared band).

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kylek
Related, you might want to check out DSCOVR-
[https://epic.gsfc.nasa.gov/](https://epic.gsfc.nasa.gov/)

If you've never heard of it, this bird always stays on the sunlit side of the
planet and takes true color images

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SiempreViernes
It takes actual full disk images too! None of this stitching shenanigance
without the edge effects that all the geo orbit satelites do.

Goes-17 sees at best 2x2 km boxes (igfov depends on wavelength) and uses
mirrors on servos to quickly scan the disk. DSCOVR is simply far enought away
that it can see the full disk.

If you need reference materials for how earth like planets look from space,
use DSCOVR images, everything else is fake!

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ogennadi
> GOES-17 is the second in a series of next-generation geostationary weather
> satellites. Like GOES-16, its sister satellite operating as GOES East,
> GOES-17 is designed to provide advanced imagery and atmospheric measurements
> of Earth from 22,300 miles above the equator.

