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Full catalog/GLREFL
GLREFL·v001·dataset

Detailed surface color in many colors from aircraft (G-LiHT)

G-LiHT Hyperspectral Reflectance V001
land NASA LPCLOUD Level 3 active GeoTIFF
In plain English

What it measures. Very detailed surface reflectance from aircraft, showing how strongly the ground reflects light across 114 narrow color bands from blue-green through near-infrared, at 1 m resolution.

How it's made. Collected by NASA's airborne G-LiHT imaging system flown about 335 m above ground, with the reflected light corrected for illumination effects and delivered as map-ready imagery.

How & where you'd use it. Used to map the makeup, structure, and health of forests and other ecosystems, mainly across parts of North America.

What's measured

LAND SURFACE › SURFACE RADIATIVE PROPERTIES › REFLECTANCESPECTRAL/ENGINEERING › LIDAR

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2011-06-30 → ongoing
  • Measured byG-LiHT (Headwall, Riegl Airborne Lidar)
  • Processing levelLevel 3
  • Spatial extent-170, 10, -50, 73
  • FormatsGeoTIFF
  • 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

Goddard’s LiDAR, Hyperspectral, and Thermal Imager ([G-LiHT](https://gliht.gsfc.nasa.gov/)) mission is a portable, airborne imaging system that aims to simultaneously map the composition, structure, and function of terrestrial ecosystems. G-LiHT primarily focuses on a broad diversity of forest communities and ecoregions in North America, mapping aerial swaths over the Conterminous United States (CONUS), Alaska, Puerto Rico, and Mexico. The purpose of G-LiHT’s Hyperspectral Reflectance data product (GLREFL) is to provide high-resolution reflectance data, ranging in wavelength from 418 to 920 nanometers across 114 spectral ranges. Reflectance data is computed as the ratio between observed upwelling radiance and downwelling hemispheric irradiance and corrected for differences in cross-track illumination and Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF) using an empirically derived multiplier. At a nominal flying height of 335 m above ground level (AGL), the at-sensor reflectance is a close approximation of surface reflectance. GLREFL data are processed as a zipped raster data product (GeoTIFF) with associated header file (.hdr) at 1 meter spatial resolution over locally defined areas. A low-resolution browse is also provided with a color map applied in PNG format.

Get the data

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

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="GLREFL",
    version="001",
    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 LPCLOUD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.