AMSR2 Snow & Ice Volume

updated monthly

Last month as gif

The AMSR2 sea ice thickness is a product by the "Arctic Data archive System". The exact algorithm is unknown to me, but it probably estimates the thickness from the AMSR2 channels (e.g. 6, 7, 10, 18, 23, 36 GHz) in either horizontal and/or vertical polarization.

Like CryoSat it can't estimate sea ice thickness beneath melt ponds or the thickness of newly frozen ice slush. Instead ADS shows a melt concentration percentage (20-50%). My algorithm estimates the ice thinning during the melt season and new ice thickness during the freezing season.

It has a higher spatial resolution (10km) than PIOMAS and higher temporal resolution for the entire Arctic than CryoSat and runs year round. It is also sensitive to snow cover and melt pond refreezing, which gives a better picture on the current melting or freezing conditions.

netCDF, csv data & 1st of month comparisons

More details about the AMSR2 Snow & Ice Volume algorithm can be found under: Documentation

ADS Raw Data visualization: https://ads.nipr.ac.jp/vishop/#/monitor

Other Sea Ice Thickness products to compare:

PIOMAS

CryoSat

AMSR2 estimated volume

In August refreezing melt ponds cancel out further volume losses in this algorithm.

In winter the snow on top of the sea ice leads to a higher volume than in other algorithms.

AMSR2 estimated thickness.

Refreezing melt ponds increase the average thickness in August until in mid September newly formed sea ice brings the average thickness down again.

In winter the snow on top of the sea ice leads to a higher thickness than in other algorithms.