Deep Space Climate Observatory is an earth observation and space weather satellite located at the Sun-Earth L1 Lagrangian point, approximately 1.5 million km from Earth. It is on a line between the Sun and the Earth, so its view of the Earth is always sunlit.

It was launched in February of this year and is now in full operation.

It has a magnetometer, charged particle sensors, radiometers to measure irradiance from the near ultraviolet to mid-infrared, and a 4 megapixel camera which acquires in 10 different spectral bands from 317 to 779 nanometers.

The Observatory was originally suggested by Al Gore (and indeed was pejoratively nicknamed GoreSat by wags and pundits).

Someone down there is waving.

Not much land mass visible, and hard to tell what the land is.

Sun-Earth L1 Lagrangian point, is this point where the gravitational attraction of Earth and the Sun is equal?

bob(from black rock) said:

Not much land mass visible, and hard to tell what the land is.

Aye.

CrazyNeutrino said:

Someone down there is waving.

Don’t wave back proly a Collingwood Supporter.

Witty Rejoinder said:

bob(from black rock) said:

Not much land mass visible, and hard to tell what the land is.

Aye.

Is the Earth “locked” to the Sun, ie presents the same view all the time?

bob(from black rock) said:

Witty Rejoinder said:

bob(from black rock) said:

Not much land mass visible, and hard to tell what the land is.

Aye.

Is the Earth “locked” to the Sun, ie presents the same view all the time?

Sorry I meant is the satellite locked to the earth.

Originally known as Triana, named after Rodrigo de Triana, the first of Columbus’s crew to sight land in the Americas, the satellite’s original purpose was to provide a near-continuous view of the entire Earth and make that live image available via the Internet. Gore hoped not only to advance science with these images, but also to raise awareness of the Earth itself, updating the influential Blue Marble photograph taken by Apollo 17. In addition to an imaging camera, a radiometer would take the first direct measurements of how much sunlight is reflected and emitted from the whole Earth (albedo). This data could constitute a barometer for the process of global warming. The scientific goals expanded to measure the amount of solar energy reaching Earth, cloud patterns, weather systems, monitor the health of Earth’s vegetation, and track the amount of UV light reaching the surface through the ozone layer.

Instruments

PlasMag

The Plasma-Magnetometer (PlasMag) measures solar wind for space weather predictions. It has three instruments:

Magnetometer measures magnetic field.
Faraday cup measures positively charged particles.
Electrostatic analyzer measures electrons.

NISTAR

National Institute of Standards and Technology Advanced Radiometer (NISTAR) measures irradiance of the sunlit face of the Earth. This data is to be used to study changes in Earth’s radiation budget caused by natural and human activities. The radiometer measures in four channels:

For total radiation in ultraviolet, visible and infrared in range of 0.2-100 µm.
For reflected solar radiation in ultraviolet, visible and near infrared in range of 0.2-4 µm.
For reflected solar radiation in infrared in range of 0.7-4 µm.
For calibration purposes in range of 0.3-1 µm.

EPIC

The Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) takes images of the sunlit side of Earth for various Earth sciences purposes, in 10 different channels from ultraviolet to near infrared. Ozone and aerosol levels will be monitored, as well as cloud dynamics, properties of the land and vegetations. .

EPIC has an aperture diameter of 30.5 cm, f 9.38, a FOV of 0.61° and an angular sampling resolution of 1.07 arcsec. Earth apparent diameter will vary from 0.45° to 0.53° full width. Exposure time for each of the 10 narrowband channels (317, 325, 340, 388, 443, 552, 680, 688, 764 and 779 nm) is about 40 ms, and camera will produce 2048×2048 pixel images, but to increase number of downloadable images to 10 per hour the resolution will be averaged to 1024×1024 onboard; final resolution will be 25 km/pixel .

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Space_Climate_Observatory

bob(from black rock) said:

Witty Rejoinder said:

bob(from black rock) said:

Not much land mass visible, and hard to tell what the land is.

Aye.

Is the Earth “locked” to the Sun, ie presents the same view all the time?

Nope.

15 Years of CERES Versus Surface Temperature: Climate Sensitivity = 1.3 deg. C
Monday, July 20th, 2015

The NASA CERES project has updated their EBAF-TOA Edition 2.8 radiative flux dataset through March of 2015, which now extends the global CERES record to just over 15 years (since March 2000, starting with NASA’s Terra satellite). This allows us to get an update of how the radiative budget of the Earth responds to surface temperature variations, which is what determines climate sensitivity and thus how much warming (and associated climate change) we can expect from a given amount of radiative forcing (assuming the forcing-feedback paradigm is sufficiently valid for the climate system).

Coincidentally, the 1.3 deg. C best estimate for the climate sensitivity from this graph is the same as we got with our 1D forcing-feedback-mixing climate model, and as I recently got with a simplified model that stores energy in the deep ocean at the observed rate (0.2 W/m2 average since the 1950s).

Again, the remaining radiative forcing in the 15 years of data causes decorrelation and (almost always) an underestimate of the feedback parameter (and overestimate of climate sensitivity). So, the real sensitivity might be well below 1.3 deg. C, as Lindzen believes. The inherent problem in diagnosing feedbacks from observational data is one which I am absolutely sure exists — and it is one which is largely ignored. Most of the “experts” who are part of the scientific consensus aren’t even aware of it, which shows how a small obscure issue can change our perception of how sensitive the climate system is.

http://www.drroyspencer.com/category/blogarticle/

https://www.skepticalscience.com/skeptic_Roy_Spencer.htm

Other professional affiliations: Dr. Spencer is on the board of directors of the George C. Marshall Institute, a right-wing conservative think tank on scientific issues and public policy. He listed as an expert for the Heartland Institute, a libertarian American public policy think tank. Dr. Spencer is also listed as an expert by the International Climate and Environmental Change Assessment Project (ICECAP), a global warming “skeptic” organization

JudgeMental said:

https://www.skepticalscience.com/skeptic_Roy_Spencer.htm

Other professional affiliations: Dr. Spencer is on the board of directors of the George C. Marshall Institute, a right-wing conservative think tank on scientific issues and public policy. He listed as an expert for the Heartland Institute, a libertarian American public policy think tank. Dr. Spencer is also listed as an expert by the International Climate and Environmental Change Assessment Project (ICECAP), a global warming “skeptic” organization

can you comment on the science he ‘s presented?

oy W. Spencer received his Ph.D. in meteorology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1981. Before becoming a Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville in 2001, he was a Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, where he and Dr. John Christy received NASA’s Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal for their global temperature monitoring work with satellites. Dr. Spencer’s work with NASA continues as the U.S. Science Team leader for the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer flying on NASA’s Aqua satellite. He has provided congressional testimony several times on the subject of global warming.

Dr. Spencer’s research has been entirely supported by U.S. government agencies: NASA, NOAA, and DOE. He has never been asked by any oil company to perform any kind of service. Not even Exxon-Mobil.

>>>https://www.skepticalscience.com/skeptic_Roy_Spencer.htm<<<

Skepticlescience’s (SKS) strategy is to begin with a popular sceptics argument then counter it with what purports to be a pro-AGW scientific consensus rebuttal. Of course there is no opportunity for the sceptic to rebut SKS’ rebuttal.
Each skeptics argument SKS initiates is couched in lay terms, making the sceptics look ignorant & intentionally leave out references that support it,. The AGW counter argument is couched in scientifically sophisticated terms, with weighty references, making AGW look scientific. What is not shown are the scientifically sophisticated sceptical responses to these AGW arguments, of which there are a great many, also with loads of weighty references. In short the site is a one-sided sham.

lol, didn’t read any of them but lol.

bob(from black rock) said:

Not much land mass visible, and hard to tell what the land is.

This is obviously the Americas.

dv said:

bob(from black rock) said:

Not much land mass visible, and hard to tell what the land is.

This is obviously the Americas.

Yes. The Gulf of California is clearly visible.

Does anyone remember seeing Earth from space (fact or fiction) where its flipped with the Southern hemisphere at the top

Cymek said:

Does anyone remember seeing Earth from space (fact or fiction) where its flipped with the Southern hemisphere at the top

Do we really know which way is up?

roughbarked said:

Cymek said:

Does anyone remember seeing Earth from space (fact or fiction) where its flipped with the Southern hemisphere at the top

Do we really know which way is up?

This is not a difficult thing to achieve … just rotate this image by 180 degrees.

roughbarked said:

Cymek said:

Does anyone remember seeing Earth from space (fact or fiction) where its flipped with the Southern hemisphere at the top

Do we really know which way is up?

That’s it though isn’t it, approaching from space or orbiting, if you assume the rotational axis is the up/down either view is correct and if you disregard the axis then any view is correct. All movies and tv shows I can remember always have the standard global perspective, then again the aliens always invade the USA or UK with the occassional kudos to Sydney as another attack site

As you all know, I get fed up to the back teeth with doomsday pundits quoting anthropogenic global warming.

However, even I can freely admit that the Deep Space Climate Observatory is a brilliant idea. Major problems with climate predictions include the effect of cloud cover, as in hotter climate → more evaporation → more cloud → cooler climate, and the problem of cobbling together disparate readings for small areas of the globe. The Deep Space Climate Observatory solves both of these problems, and probably many other problems as well.

The graph shown above “15 Years of CERES Versus Surface Temperature: Climate Sensitivity = 1.3 deg. C” is so bad that I would hesitate to draw any line through the data. Hopefully Deep Space Climate Observatory will help to put another hundred or more points on this graph.

It doesn’t solve the “cloud at night” problem. From the web “The cloud detection algorithm can use the AVHRR visible channels for daylight passes, however, at night only the thermal channels are available. This means that the cloud detection process is less effective at night. Thin cloud is particularly difficult to detect at night and can depress the apparent surface emitted radiance. A rough estimate would be that 40% of thin cloud at night is not detected by the Saunders and Kriebel algorithm. This proportion will vary widely with each scene, and be dependent on time of day, season and location.”

Cool images too. I hope they’re made available in movie form.

mollwollfumble said:

As you all know, I get fed up to the back teeth with doomsday pundits quoting anthropogenic global warming.

If you bothered to learn something about the state of the environment, rather than making ridiculous assumptions, you might be more concerned.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2015/08/05/dscovr_moon_transits_earth.html

The Deep Space Climate Orbiter took some snaps of the moon transiting the earth. These images make clear how dark the moon is.