We present field measurements collected during the FINNARP 2022 expedition at the Aboa station, located in Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. Field observations were carried out weekly at the automatic weather station site as well as at selected overpass locations of two satellites. The measurements included continuous meteorological observations from the weather station, detailed snow pit profiles, ground-based and drone-based radiation measurements, and snow surface roughness with laser scanners.

Snow cover is an important variable when studying the effect of climate change in the Arctic. Therefore, the correct detection of snowfall is important. In this study, we present methods to detect snowfall accurately using satellite observations. The snowfall event detection results of our limited area are encouraging. We find that further development could enable application over the whole Arctic, providing necessary information on precipitation occurrence over remote areas.

We describe a new climate data record describing the surface albedo, or reflectivitity, of Earth's surface (called CLARA-A3 SAL). The climate data record spans over 4 decades of satellite observations, beginning in 1979. We conduct a quality assessment of the generated data, comparing them against other satellite data and albedo observations made on the ground. We find that the new data record in general matches surface observations well and is stable through time.

We evaluated snow cover properties in state-of-the-art reanalyses (ERA5 and ERA5-Land) with satellite-based datasets. Both ERA5 and ERA5-Land overestimate snow mass, whereas albedo estimates are more consistent between the datasets. Snow cover extent (SCE) is accurately described in ERA5-Land, while ERA5 shows larger SCE than the satellite-based datasets. The trends in snow mass, SCE, and albedo are mostly negative in 1982–2018, and the negative trends become more apparent when spring advances.

This paper presents a global climate data record on cloud parameters, radiation at the surface and at the top of atmosphere, and surface albedo. The temporal coverage is 1979–2020 (42 years) and the data record is also continuously updated until present time. Thus, more than four decades of climate parameters are provided. Based on CLARA-A3, studies on distribution of clouds and radiation parameters can be made and, especially, investigations of climate trends and evaluation of climate models.