The Global Land Surface Satellite (GLASS) Remote Sensing Data Processing System and Products

Using remotely sensed satellite products is the most efficient way to monitor global land, water, and forest resource changes, which are believed to be the main factors for understanding global climate change and its impacts. A reliable remotely sensed product should be retrieved quantitatively through models or statistical methods. However, producing global products requires a complex computing system and massive volumes of multi-sensor and multi-temporal remotely sensed data. This manuscript describes the ground Global LAnd Surface Satellite (GLASS) product generation system that can be used to generate long-sequence time series of global land surface data products based on various remotely sensed data. To ensure stabilization and efficiency in running the system, we used the methods of task management, parallelization, and multi I/O channels. An array of GLASS remote sensing products related to global land surface parameters are currently being produced and distributed by the Center for Global Change Data Processing and Analysis at Beijing Normal University in Beijing, China. These products include Leaf Area Index (LAI), land surface albedo, and broadband emissivity (BBE) from the years 1981 to 2010, downward shortwave radiation (DSR) and photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) from the years 2008 to 2010.