GOCI, the world's first geostationary ocean color observation satellite, for the monitoring of temporal variability in coastal water turbidity

Abstract

The primary advantage of the Geostationary Ocean Color Imager (GOCI), the world's first geostationary ocean color observation satellite, over other ocean color satellite imagers is that it can obtain data every hour during the daytime, allowing ocean monitoring in near real time. Here, we investigated temporal variation in turbidity along a coastal region. To estimate suspended sediment concentrations (SSC), water samples and radiometric data were collected from waters in the Mokpo coastal area, located along the west coast of Korea. GOCI images acquired on the same day as the samples were used to generate a map of turbidity and to estimate the differences in SSC displayed in each image. Hourly GOCI images successfully identified the temporal variation in turbidity, which is mainly driven by the tidal cycle. A hydrodynamic model also showed that the GOCI-derived turbidity variation was reliable. This study shows that the GOCI can be effectively used to monitor the temporal dynamics of the turbidity of coastal waters, i.e., sediment movements driven by the tidal cycle along the west coast of the Korean Peninsula.