Air Quality: Nitrogen Dioxide (NO₂) Satellite Measurements

The current surface albedo climatology used has a spatial resolution of 0.5° x 0.5° (approximately 55 x 55 km), which is coarse compared to the much higher spatial resolution used by S5p TROPOMI of 3.5 x 5.5 km. As a consequence, the albedo grid affects the NO₂ column products quality, especially in coastal areas.

In general, TROPOMI underestimates the tropospheric NO₂ densities at polluted sites. The median negative biases of the daily comparisons are generally less than 50% (the product requirement for tropospheric NO₂), but can be quite variable depending on station and NO₂ level.

Good coherence is found between TROPOMI and Multi Axis Differential Absorption Spectroscopy (MAX-DOAS) NO₂ datasets with a correlation coefficient of 0.84.

For more information on the data quality, please see the product readme file.