Satellite-based assessment of direct aerosol radiative forcing using a look-up table established through AERONET observations

Direct aerosol radiative forcing (DARF) plays an important role in atmospheric radiation budget and climate condition, which can be calculated by ground-based data with high-precision and satellite data with high spatial coverage. For this paper, a novel satellite-based DARF assessment method was developed to calculate DARF at shortwave (0.25–4 µm) using satellite data, and the Look-up table of single scattering albedo (SSA) and asymmetry factor (ASY). Accuracy was validated for results obtained in Beijing using this method with results calculated from high-precision Aerosol Robotic NET-work (AERONET) data, and their correlation coefficients at the top of atmosphere (TOA), bottom of atmosphere (BOT) and with atmosphere (ATM) were 0.88, 0.93 and 0.74, respectively. The performance of DARF calculation results was analyzed at annual and monthly scales, and it is reasonable compared with previous study. In addition, the method was applied under diverse conditions, i.e., aerosol types conditions, atmospheric pollution conditions and season conditions, and works well. The results in this study suggest that the satellite-based DARF assessment method can be used for studying shortwave DARF and support the research about regional aerosol radiative forcing using satellite data.