Building a Cloud-based Global Snow Observatory

Snow covers some 40 percent of Earth's land masses year in and year out and constitutes a vitally important variable for the planet's climate, hydrology, and biosphere due to its high albedo and insulation. It affects atmospheric circulation patterns, permafrost, glacier mass balance, river discharge, and groundwater recharge (Dietz et al. 2015). Snow is also nature's igloo where species from microscopic fungi to 800-pound moose survive the winter each in its own way (Pauli et al. 2013; Petty et al. 2015). Many studies have found that snow in high elevation regions is particularly sensitive to global climate change and is considered as sentinel of change. For human beings, about one-sixth of the world's population depends on seasonal snow and glaciers for their water supply (Barnett et al. 2005) and more than 50% of mountainous areas have an essential or supportive role for downstream regions (Viviroli et al. 2007). Large snowstorms also have a major impact on society in terms of human life, economic loss, and disruption (Squires et al. 2014). Remote sensing provides a practical approach of monitoring global snow and ice cover change. Based on our comprehensive validation and assessment on MODIS snow products, we build a cloud-based Global Snow Observatory (GSO) using Google Earth Engine (GEE) to serve as a platform for global researchers and the general public to access, visualize, and analyze snow data and to build snowmelt runoff models for mountain watersheds. Specifically, we build the GSO to serve global MODIS daily snow cover data and their analyses through GEE on Google App Engine. The GSO provides users the functions of accessing and extracting cloud-gap-filled snow data and interactive snow cover change exploration. In addition to snow cover frequency (SCF), we also plan to develop several other snow cover parameters, including snow cover duration/days, snow cover onset dates, and snow cover melting dates, and to study the shift and trend of global snow cover characteristics.