Time series of the Inland Surface Water Dataset in China (ISWDC) for 2000–2016 derived from MODIS archives

Abstract

The moderate spatial resolution and high temporal resolution of MODIS imagery make it an ideal resource for time series surface water monitoring and mapping. We used MODIS MOD09Q1 surface reflectance archive images to create an Inland Surface Water Dataset in China (ISWDC), which maps water bodies larger than 0.0625 km2 within the land mass of China for the period 2000–2016, with 8 d temporal and 250 m spatial resolution. We assessed the accuracy of the ISWDC by comparing it with the national land cover derived surface water data and global surface water (GSW) data. The results show that the ISWDC is closely correlated with the national reference data with coefficient of determination (R2) greater than 0.99 in 2000, 2005, and 2010, while the ISWDC possesses very good consistency, very similar change dynamics, and similar spatial patterns in different regions with the GSW dataset. The ISWDC dataset can be used for studies on the inter-annual and seasonal variation of the surface water systems. It can also be used as reference data for verification of the other surface water dataset and as an input parameter for regional and global hydro-climatic models. The ISWDC data are available at: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.2616035.