Tracking Earth’s Energy Imbalance: CERES Radiative Analysis, Heat Uptake Comparisons, and Perspectives from the Uvsq-Sat Nano-Satellite Series
Abstract
Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) is the small residual between absorbed solar radiation and outgoing thermal radiation at the top of the atmosphere (TOA). We analyse global monthly fluxes from the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) Energy Balanced and Filled (EBAF) Ed4.2.1 record from March 2000 to March 2026, together with complementary solar, cloud, greenhouse gas, El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), sea surface temperature (SST), sea-ice, and ocean heat content datasets. Over 2001–2025, the CERES net TOA radiative flux (NET) anomaly relative to 2001–2020 shows a trend of +0.451 ± 0.196 W m−2 decade−1 (95% confidence interval; R2 = 0.496). The algebraic decomposition of this trend using N = ISR − OSR − OLR , where ISR, OSR, and OLR denote incoming solar radiation, reflected shortwave radiation, and outgoing longwave radiation, respectively, yields component contributions of +0.071, +0.806, and −0.426 W m−2 decade−1. The reduction in reflected shortwave radiation is therefore the largest positive contribution to the observed NET trend. Raw annual correlations with greenhouse gas indicators, SST, and sea ice are substantially weakened after detrending. When accounting for annual serial correlation and false discovery rate (FDR) control, only CERES cloud area and ocean heat uptake from the Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean (ECCO) state estimate retain significant annual associations with NET. Detrended monthly lag analyses further show significant negative relationships between CERES NET and the Niño-3.4 and MEI.v2 indices, with the strongest correlations occurring when the ENSO indices precede NET by approximately 6–7 months. Over the strictly common 222-month interval (July 2005–December 2023), CERES NET shows strong temporal covariability with complementary heat-uptake estimates. The correlation coefficients over this common interval are r = 0.857 for ECCO ocean heat uptake and r = 0.804 for the planetary heat-storage estimate including atmospheric energy tendency. The corresponding detrended correlations are r = 0.760 and r = 0.640, respectively. The Uvsq-Sat NET record overlaps CERES observations, while Uvsq-Sat NG continues this measurement sequence. Its current time series remains too short to support climatological or long-term trend analyses and is therefore not yet used for such analyses. These results motivate a hybrid observing architecture combining reference radiometers, cross-calibrated broadband nano-satellites, targeted spectral measurements, and planetary heat-storage estimates.
Related
- Satellite-based estimates of radiative forcing of long-lived halogenated gases from spectral observations
- A controlled protocol for synchronized advancement cost in GPU shallow-water models: scoped comparisons and implementation decisions with RapidFlow v0.1
- Asymmetric bloom lengthening drives high-latitude ocean chlorophyll accumulation imbalance
- Uncertainty Quantification in Forecast Comparisons
- Climate Sensitivity from 21st-Century Trends in Earth's Energy Imbalance
BibTeX
@article{meftah2026tracking,
title = {{Tracking Earth’s Energy Imbalance: CERES Radiative Analysis, Heat Uptake Comparisons, and Perspectives from the Uvsq-Sat Nano-Satellite Series}},
author = {Mustapha Meftah and Christophe Dufour and Tsovinar Karapetyan and Alain Sarkissian and Ping Zhu and Nahla Ben-Naghrouzi and Pierre-Richard Dahoo and Philippe Keckhut},
journal = {Remote Sensing},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.3390/rs18203559},
url = {https://hal.science/hal-05839077v1},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Tracking Earth’s Energy Imbalance: CERES Radiative Analysis, Heat Uptake Comparisons, and Perspectives from the Uvsq-Sat Nano-Satellite Series
AU - Mustapha Meftah
AU - Christophe Dufour
AU - Tsovinar Karapetyan
AU - Alain Sarkissian
AU - Ping Zhu
AU - Nahla Ben-Naghrouzi
AU - Pierre-Richard Dahoo
AU - Philippe Keckhut
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/17
JO - Remote Sensing
DO - 10.3390/rs18203559
UR - https://hal.science/hal-05839077v1
AB - Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) is the small residual between absorbed solar radiation and outgoing thermal radiation at the top of the atmosphere (TOA). We analyse global monthly fluxes from the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) Energy Balanced and Filled (EBAF) Ed4.2.1 record from March 2000 to March 2026, together with complementary solar, cloud, greenhouse gas, El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), sea surface temperature (SST), sea-ice, and ocean heat content datasets. Over 2001–2025, the CERES net TOA radiative flux (NET) anomaly relative to 2001–2020 shows a trend of +0.451 ± 0.196 W m−2 decade−1 (95% confidence interval; R2 = 0.496). The algebraic decomposition of this trend using N = ISR − OSR − OLR , where ISR, OSR, and OLR denote incoming solar radiation, reflected shortwave radiation, and outgoing longwave radiation, respectively, yields component contributions of +0.071, +0.806, and −0.426 W m−2 decade−1. The reduction in reflected shortwave radiation is therefore the largest positive contribution to the observed NET trend. Raw annual correlations with greenhouse gas indicators, SST, and sea ice are substantially weakened after detrending. When accounting for annual serial correlation and false discovery rate (FDR) control, only CERES cloud area and ocean heat uptake from the Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean (ECCO) state estimate retain significant annual associations with NET. Detrended monthly lag analyses further show significant negative relationships between CERES NET and the Niño-3.4 and MEI.v2 indices, with the strongest correlations occurring when the ENSO indices precede NET by approximately 6–7 months. Over the strictly common 222-month interval (July 2005–December 2023), CERES NET shows strong temporal covariability with complementary heat-uptake estimates. The correlation coefficients over this common interval are r = 0.857 for ECCO ocean heat uptake and r = 0.804 for the planetary heat-storage estimate including atmospheric energy tendency. The corresponding detrended correlations are r = 0.760 and r = 0.640, respectively. The Uvsq-Sat NET record overlaps CERES observations, while Uvsq-Sat NG continues this measurement sequence. Its current time series remains too short to support climatological or long-term trend analyses and is therefore not yet used for such analyses. These results motivate a hybrid observing architecture combining reference radiometers, cross-calibrated broadband nano-satellites, targeted spectral measurements, and planetary heat-storage estimates.
SN - 2072-4292
ER -