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Full catalog/sentinel-5p-l2-aer-ai-rpro
sentinel-5p-l2-aer-ai-rpro·dataset

Smoke and dust haze tracker, global (Copernicus)

Sentinel-5P Level 2 Ultraviolet Aerosol Index (RPRO)
atmosphere ESA ESA Copernicus active
In plain English

What it measures. Maps the UV Aerosol Index, a simple number that flags where light-absorbing particles like smoke, desert dust, and volcanic ash are floating in the air. Higher values mean thicker, darker hazes overhead.

How it's made. Derived from ultraviolet light measured by the TROPOMI instrument on ESA Copernicus's Sentinel-5P satellite, as a Level-2 product reprocessed for a consistent long-term record (RPRO).

How & where you'd use it. Helps track wildfire smoke plumes, dust storms, and volcanic ash clouds across countries, useful for air-quality alerts and aviation safety.

What's measured

SentinelCopernicusESASatelliteGlobalAtmosphereL2AER-AIRPROEUEC

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2018-04-30 → ongoing
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90

What you can do with it

  • Map air pollutants — NO₂, aerosols, ozone
  • Track greenhouse gases and Earth's energy budget
  • Feed weather and air-quality analysis
Official description

This Collection provides Sentinel-5P Level-2 AER AI products, which contains high-resolution imagery of the UV Aerosol Index (UVAI), also called the Absorbing Aerosol Index (AAI).

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=["sentinel-5p-l2-aer-ai-rpro"],   # 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.