GHRSST Level 4 AVHRR_OI Global Blended Sea Surface Temperature Analysis from NCEI (GDS versions 1 and 2)

A Group for High Resolution Sea Surface Temperature (GHRSST) global Level 4 sea surface temperature analysis is produced daily on a 0.25 degree grid at the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information. This product uses optimal interpolation (OI) by interpolating and extrapolating SST observations from different sources, resulting in a smoothed complete field. The sources of data are satellite (AVHRR) and in situ platforms (i.e., ships, buoys, and Argo floats above 5m depth), and the specific datasets employed may change over time. In the regions with sea-ice concentration higher than 30%, freezing points of seawater are used to generate proxy SSTs. A preliminary version of this file is produced in near-real time (1-day latency), and then replaced with a final version after 2 weeks. The v2.1 is updated from the AVHRR_OI-NCEI-L4-GLOB-v2.0 data. Major improvements include: 1) In-Situ ship and buoy data changed from the NCEP Traditional Alphanumeric Codes (TAC) to the NCEI merged TAC + Binary Universal Form for the Representation (BUFR) data, with large increase of buoy data included to correct satellite SST biases; 2) Addition of Argo float observed SST data as well, for further correction of satellite SST biases; 3) Satellite input from the METOP-A and NOAA-19 to METOP-A and METOP-B, removing degraded satellite data; 4) Revised ship-buoy SST corrections for improved accuracy; and 5) Revised sea-ice-concentration to SST conversion to remove warm biases in the Arctic region (Banzon et al. 2020). These updates only apply to granules after Jan. 1st, 2016. The data pre 2016 are still the same as v2.0 except for metadata upgrades.