
The Goddard Space Flight Center built the Earth Radiation Budget Satellite (ERBS) on which the first ERBE instruments were launched by the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1984. ERBE instruments were also launched on two National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather monitoring satellites, NOAA 9 and NOAA 10 in 1984 and 1986. The purpose was to develop a new generation of instrumentation to make accurate regional and global measurements of the components of the radiation budget.
Key Limitations:
- Due to satellite issues, the original ERBE data are not suitable for climate studies
Data Access: Please Cite data sources, following the data providers' instructions.
- Barkstrom, B. R., and J. B. Hall, 1982: Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE)—An overview. J. Energy, 6, 141–146.
- Fasullo, J. T., and K. E. Trenberth, 2008: The Annual Cycle of the Energy Budget: Global Means and Land-Ocean Exchanges, J. Clim., 21, 2314-2326
- Hansen, J., and co-authors, 2005: Earth's energy imbalance: Confirmation and implications. Science, 308, 1431-1435
- Trenberth, K. E., 1997: Using atmospheric budgets as a constraint on surface fluxes. J. Climate, 10, 2796–2809