Validation of Expanded Trend-to-Trend Cross-Calibration Technique and Its Application to Global Scale

Abstract

The expanded Trend-to-Trend (T2T) cross-calibration technique has the potential to calibrate two sensors in much less time and provides trends on a daily assessment basis. The trend obtained from the expanded technique aids in evaluating the differences between satellite sensors. Therefore, this technique was validated with several trusted cross-calibration techniques to evaluate its accuracy. Initially, the expanded T2T technique was validated with three independent RadCaTS RRV, DIMITRI-PICS, and APICS models, and results show a 1% average difference with other models over all bands. Further, this technique was validated with other SDSU techniques to calibrate the newly launched satellite Landsat 9 with 8, demonstrating good agreement in all bands within 0.5%. This technique was also validated for Terra MODIS and ETM+, showing consistency within 1% for all bands compared to four PICS sites. Additionally, the T2T technique was applied to a global scale using EPICS Global sites. The expanded T2T cross-calibration gain result obtained for Landsat 8 versus Landsat 7/8, Sentinel 2A/2B, and Terra/Aqua MODIS presented that the difference between these pairs was within 0.5–1% for most of the spectral bands. Total uncertainty obtained for these pairs of sensors using Monte Carlo Simulation varies from 2.5–4% for all bands except for SWIR2 bands, which vary up to 5%. The difference between EPICS Global and EPICS North Africa was calculated using the ratio of trend gain; the difference among them was within 0.5–1% difference on average for all the sensors and bands within a 0.5% uncertainty level difference.