Tuz Gölü site Characteristics

An international team of remote sensing calibration experts, representing space agencies from 10 different countries, conducted a two week field campaign at Tuz Golu, Turkey in August, 2010 sponsored by the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites (CEOS). While the campaign focused on surface reflectance factor measurement, five specific CEOS objectives were being addressed: evaluating differences in field instrument primary calibrations, evaluating difference in field characterization methodologies and possible establishment of best practices, perform a multi-sensor absolute calibration comparison, identification of minimum and ideal instrumentation / characterization for use as a reference standard, and formal characterization of the Tuz Golu absolute calibration site. This paper will focus on the latter component. An evaluation of the temporal, spatial and directional dependencies of the surface reflectance of the Tuz Golu salt flat will be presented. Also, an evaluation of the optical atmospheric stability of the site was conducted.