Monitoring of Floating Green Algae Using Ocean Color Satellite Remote Sensing

Recently, floating green algae (FGA) in open oceans and coastal waters have been reported over wide area, yet accurate detection of these using traditional ground based measurement and chemical analysis in the laboratory has been difficult or even impossible due to the lack of spatial resolution, coverage, and revisit frequency. In contrast, spectral reflectance measurement makes it possible to quickly assess the chlorophyll content in green algae. Our objectives are to investigate the spectral reflectance of the FGA observed in the Yellow Sea and to develop a new index to detect FGA from satellite imagery, namely floating green algae index (FGAI), which uses relatively simple reflectance ratio technique. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Geostationary Ocean Color Imager (GOCI) satellite images at 500m spatial resolution were utilized to produce FGAI which is defined as the ratio between reflectance at 860nm and 660nm bands. Both FGAI results yielded reasonable green algae detection at the regional scale distribution. Especially houly GOCI observations can present more detaield information of FGAI than low-orbit satellite.