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Full catalog/modis-aqua-myd17a3hgf
modis-aqua-myd17a3hgf·dataset

Yearly plant growth and carbon storage map (Aqua)

MODIS Aqua Net Primary Production Gap-Filled Yearly L4 Global 500m
biosphere ESA ESA Copernicus active
In plain English

What it measures. It gives a once-a-year figure for both the carbon plants capture (gross productivity) and the carbon they actually keep as new growth (net primary productivity), at 500-meter resolution. In short, it shows how much vegetation grew across the whole year.

How it's made. Created by ESA Copernicus from NASA's MODIS instrument on Aqua by summing all the 8-day readings across a year and patching gaps with interpolated leaf-cover data; it is a Level-4 product released after each year ends.

How & where you'd use it. Helps measure how much carbon ecosystems lock away annually, track forest and crop health over time, and feed climate and land-management models.

What's measured

MODISAquaNASASatelliteGlobalVegetationNPPGPPNet Primary ProductivityCarbon500mMYD17A3HGF

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2002-07-04 → ongoing
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90

What you can do with it

  • Map vegetation, forests and biomass
  • Monitor ecosystem productivity and carbon
  • Support habitat and biodiversity studies
Official description

The MODIS Aqua MYD17A3HGF Version 6.1 product provides annual estimates of Gross Primary Productivity (GPP) and Net Primary Productivity (NPP) at 500 m spatial resolution. The dataset is generated by summing all 8-day GPP and Net Photosynthesis (PSN) values from the MYD17A2H product over a given year, where PSN is calculated as GPP minus Maintenance Respiration (MR). The gap-filled product is produced at the end of each year once the complete annual MYD15A2H LAI/FPAR dataset becomes available. Poor-quality LAI/FPAR inputs are identified using quality control flags and replaced through linear interpolation to improve data consistency. Because of this processing approach, the dataset is not available in near-real time and is released only after the full yearly dataset has been completed.

Get the data

copernicus_access.py
# ESA Copernicus Data Space — open STAC API (free account)
from pystac_client import Client

cat = Client.open("https://stac.dataspace.copernicus.eu/v1")
search = cat.search(
    collections=["modis-aqua-myd17a3hgf"],   # add _cog or _nc for a format variant
    bbox=(-10, 35, 30, 60),             # your area (W,S,E,N)
    datetime="2024-01-01/2024-12-31",
)
items = list(search.items())            # then read assets with rioxarray / xarray
Browsing the Copernicus STAC is open; downloading bytes needs a free Copernicus Data Space account.