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Full catalog/ATL08QL
ATL08QL·v007·dataset

Land and tree height, quick-look (ICESat-2)

ATLAS/ICESat-2 L3A Land and Vegetation Height Quick Look V007
land NASA NSIDC_CPRD Level 3 active HDF5
In plain English

What it measures. Along-track estimates of ground (terrain) height, the height of the vegetation canopy on top, and how much canopy cover there is.

How it's made. A fast preliminary ('quick look') version produced from the ATLAS laser altimeter on ICESat-2, using the same methods as the final product; it is replaced once the final files are ready.

How & where you'd use it. Lets users get an early look at terrain and forest height for time-sensitive work, with the understanding it is provisional.

What's measured

LAND SURFACE › TOPOGRAPHY › TERRAIN ELEVATIONBIOSPHERE › VEGETATION › CANOPY CHARACTERISTICS › VEGETATION HEIGHT

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2026-03-01 → ongoing
  • Measured byICESat-2 (ATLAS)
  • Processing levelLevel 3
  • Spatial extent-180, -88, 180, 88
  • FormatsHDF5
  • StatusACTIVE

What you can do with it

  • Track deforestation, fire scars and land-cover change
  • Monitor crop and vegetation health (NDVI/EVI)
  • Map how built-up vs. green an area is over time
Official description

ATL08QL is the quick look version of ATL08 and is based on the same algorithms that generate the ATL08 final data products. Once final ATL08 files are available, the corresponding ATL08QL files are removed. ATL08QL contains along-track estimates of terrain height, canopy height, and canopy cover, as well as beam and reference parameters. Data were acquired by the Advanced Topographic Laser Altimeter System (ATLAS) instrument on board the ICESat-2 observatory.

Get the data

atl08ql_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="ATL08QL",
    version="007",
    bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9),  # your area (W,S,E,N)
    temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"),       # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results)   # stream straight from NSIDC_CPRD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.