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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">EGUsphere</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>EGUsphere</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="nlm-ta">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub"></issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Copernicus Publications</publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/egusphere-2026-1631</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>Acceleration After 2020 of Decreasing Earth Albedo from DSCOVR-EPIC 2015&amp;ndash;2025 Compared with CERES 2000&amp;ndash;2025</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Herman</surname>
<given-names>Jay R.</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9146-1632</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Ziemke</surname>
<given-names>Jerald</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>Goddard Earth Sciences Technology and Research-2 (GESTAR-2) University of Maryland Baltimore County, Baltimore Maryland, USA</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>Goddard Earth Sciences Technology and Research II (GESTAR-2) Morgan State University, 27 Baltimore, Maryland, USA</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>18</day>
<month>05</month>
<year>2026</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>2026</volume>
<fpage>1</fpage>
<lpage>23</lpage>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright: &#x000a9; 2026 Jay R. Herman</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2026</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access">
<license-p>This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this licence, visit <ext-link ext-link-type="uri"  xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/</ext-link></license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-1631/">This article is available from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-1631/</self-uri>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-1631/egusphere-2026-1631.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-1631/egusphere-2026-1631.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>The 10-year Earth albedo time series, its seasonal and wavelength dependence (10 wavelengths from 317.5 to 779.5 nm) of the illuminated Earth are estimated from radiance measurements by the Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera EPIC located in an orbit around the Earth-Sun Lagrange-1 point L&lt;sub&gt;1&lt;/sub&gt;. The measurements were made at a backscattered observing phase angle ranging from 2&amp;deg; to 12&amp;deg;. The maximum albedo occurs at 340 nm, ranging from 0.33 in June to 0.38 in December. For shorter wavelengths, 325 and 317.3 nm, the albedo decreases sharply because of ozone absorption. For wavelengths longer than 340 nm (388, 443, and 551 nm) the albedo decreases gradually until about 680 nm where reflectivity from vegetation increases (680 and 779.5 nm). The maximum albedo occurs in December when the illuminated Antarctic ice sheet is observed. The EPIC solar flux weighted annual mean albedo in 2016 is estimated to be 0.298 (317.5 to 779.5 nm) and 0.293 in 2025, (-1.68% change) compared to the Clouds and the Earth&apos;s Radiant Energy System (CERES) 2016 values of 0.289 and 0.284 in 2025 (-1.73% change) for the spectral range 300 to 5000 nm. The long-term trend of CERES albedo R&lt;sub&gt;AC&lt;/sub&gt; (2000&amp;ndash;2025.7) = -0.094&amp;plusmn;0.0007% yr&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt; for a total linear change of 2.35% over 25 years, However, the albedo shows an accelerating decline after 2020, R&lt;sub&gt;AC&lt;/sub&gt; (2020&amp;ndash;2025.7) = &amp;shy;0.27 &amp;plusmn; 0.001% yr&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt; compared to R&lt;sub&gt;AC&lt;/sub&gt; (2000&amp;ndash;2020) -0.09 &amp;plusmn; 0.0006% yr&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt;. Because the decline is non-linear, the total 25-year change is -2.7%. EPIC observes similar rates of albedo decline, R&lt;sub&gt;AE &lt;/sub&gt;(2016&amp;ndash;2019.5) = -0.18 &amp;plusmn; 0.0006% yr&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt; and R&lt;sub&gt;AE &lt;/sub&gt;(2020.3&amp;ndash;2025) = &amp;shy;0.25 &amp;plusmn; 0.001% yr&lt;sup&gt;-1&lt;/sup&gt; validating the increased rate of albedo decline after 2020. This suggests that the accelerating reduced Earth reflection of sunlight back to space is enhancing global warming.</p>
</abstract>
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<funding-group>
<award-group id="gs1">
<funding-source>Goddard Space Flight Center</funding-source>
<award-id>JCET 00008689</award-id>
</award-group>
</funding-group>
</article-meta>
</front>
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