The total sky imager (TSI) measures the fraction of the sky view covered by clouds.
It provides time series of hemispheric sky images during daylight hours and retrievals of fractional sky cover for periods when the solar elevation is greater than 10 degrees. To view current sky cover retrievals at the ARM sites, see the TSI most recent sky images.
The purpose is to visually identify inhomogeneities in cloud cover in 15-minute intervals and to diagnose causes for data discrepency between wide-field-of-view and narrow-field-of-view measurements of shallow cumulus cloud cover.
| Facility Name | Start Date |
|---|---|
| Lamont, OK (Extended, Shipping) | 2016-12-15 |
| Central Facility, Lamont, OK | 2000-07-01 |
| Graciosa Island, Azores, Portugal | 2013-10-01 |
| Gunnison, CO; AMF2 (main site for SAIL) | 2021-09-01 |
| Developed By | Jessica Kleiss | Erin Riley |
| Contact | Erin Riley |
| Resource(s) |
Data Directory ReadMe |
| Data format | png, csv |
| Site | SGP |
| Content time range | 1 July 2000 - 5 February 2023 |
| Attribute accuracy | The QC field is called QC1530. Values of 1(good data) passes requirements for input data availability and quality control on multiple cloud layers and TSI data quality. Described in readme.txt |
| Positional accuracy | No formal positional accuracy tests were conducted. |
| Data Consistency and Completeness | The QC field is called QC1530. Values of 1(good data) pass requirements for input data availability and quality control on multiple cloud layers and TSI data quality. Described in readme.txt Data were acquired May-September, days with single-layer shallow cumulus only. |
| Access Restriction | No access constraints are associated with this data. |
| Use Restriction | No use constraints are associated with this data. |
| File naming convention | "sgptsiquicklookC1_20000703.png": (site)(instrument)(quicklook)(facility)_(yyyymmdd).png ; sgptsiQLtableC1_20000708.csv: (site)(instrument)(QLtable)(facility)_(yyyymmdd).csv |
| Directory Organization | two folders with files in them 1) images 2) data |
| Citations | Riley, EA, JM Kleiss, LD Riihimaki, CN Long, LK Berg, and E Kassianov. 201). "Beyond field-of-view: Challenges in assigning uncertainties in shallow cumulus cloud fraction." Atmospheric Measurement Techniques. (in preparation) |
Manandhar P, M Temimi, and Z Aung. 2023. "Short-term solar radiation forecast using total sky imager via transfer learning." Energy Reports, 9(1), 10.1016/j.egyr.2022.11.087.
Barrett P, S Abel, H Coe, I Crawford, A Dobracki, J Haywood, S Howell, A Jones, J Langridge, G McFarquhar, G Nott, H Price, J Redemann, Y Shinozuka, K Szpek, J Taylor, R Wood, H Wu, P Zuidema, S Bauguitte, R Bennett, K Bower, H Chen, S Cochrane, M Cotterell, N Davies, D Delene, C Flynn, A Freedman, S Freitag, S Gupta, D Noone, T Onasch, J Podolske, M Poellot, S Schmidt, S Springston, A Sedlacek III, J Trembath, A Vance, M Zawadowicz, and J Zhang. 2022. "Intercomparison of airborne and surface-based measurements during the CLARIFY, ORACLES and LASIC field experiments." Atmospheric Measurement Techniques, 15(21), 10.5194/amt-15-6329-2022.
Research Highlight
Yang J, Y Xie, M Sengupta, Y Liu, and H Long. 2022. "Parameterization of cloud transmittance for expeditious assessment and forecasting of all-sky DNI." Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, 14(6), 063703, 10.1063/5.0127454.
Fast J, D Bell, G Kulkarni, J Liu, F Mei, G Saliba, J Shilling, K Suski, J Tomlinson, J Wang, R Zaveri, and A Zelenyuk. 2022. "Using aircraft measurements to characterize subgrid-scale variability of aerosol properties near the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Southern Great Plains site." Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 22(17), 10.5194/acp-22-11217-2022.
Research Highlight
Giangrande S, J Comstock, S Collis, J Shilling, K Gaustad, K Kehoe, S Xie, and D Zhang. 2022. Translator Plan: A Coordinated Vision for Fiscal Years 2023-2025. Ed. by Robert Stafford, ARM user facility. DOE/SC-ARM-22-003. 10.2172/1893730.