Net solar radiation is an essential parameter that characterizes surface energy exchange and plays a critical role in climate change, solar power generation, and agricultural irrigation. Although the global GLASS surface all-wave daily net radiation (NR) product exhibits high overall accuracy, a comprehensive quality assessment for continental China remains lacking, resulting in unclear regional applicability. Therefore, this study focuses on mainland China. Based on solar net radiation observations from 50 meteorological stations (2000–2016) and 37 ecological stations (2000–2020), four evaluation metrics were used: the correlation coefficient (R), mean bias error (MBE), root mean square error (RMSE), and coefficient of determination (R2). The results indicate that, during the study period, GLASS NR showed relatively small deviations from the observed values across most regions of China, with significant discrepancies observed only in southern Yunnan, Guangdong, Guangxi, and Hainan. Seasonally, GLASS NR performed better in autumn and winter than in spring and summer. Interannually, there was only a slight decline in data quality for a few individual years; however, overall, an upward trend was observed. Regarding land cover types, GLASS NR accuracy was lower for shrublands, forests, and grasslands, whereas it performed better for other land cover types. Overall, the GLASS NR product demonstrates high accuracy and good temporal continuity across mainland China. However, significant regional variations exist, and localized applications require optimization and refinement. This study provides valuable insights for improving net radiation products across multiple spatiotemporal scales.
Yan et al. (Fri,) studied this question.