Deriving Water Diffuse Attenuation Coefficient Kd Using ICESat-2 Bathymetric Information

Abstract

The diffuse attenuation coefficient $K_{d}$ continues to play a crucial role in oceanographic research works. Recently, Ice, Cloud, and Land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) has shown its great ability to estimate $K_{d}$ using the water column decay profiles. However, the weak water column backscattered signals are vulnerable to afterpulses and solar background noise, making this way perform not well in the daytime and in nearshore areas. In this study, a method to estimate $K_{d}$ is proposed which innovatively uses ICESat-2 bathymetric signal intensities. The main principle is to calculate the attenuation in water column transmission by bathymetric lidar equations. Since the seafloor signal level is much stronger than that of the water column, a significant advantage is the greater noise immunity, i.e., the ability to operate under strong background noise and afterpulses interference. The performance is validated against the moderate-resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) ocean color measurements with mean relative differences (MRDs) of <32% using both daytime and nighttime ICESat-2 data in six sea and large lake nearshore areas. Based on the new generation of spaceborne lidar data, this study explores a new path to monitor water qualities in nearshore areas. This method is applicable where seafloor photons exist in both daytime and nighttime.