The frequency of cloud cover in New Zealand presents significant challenges for optical remote sensing – there is a reason NZ is known as the land of the long white cloud! Taking the approach developed for Guyana, New Zealand wide quarterly Sentinel-1 mosaics were generated. Check them out in this demo.
The ability of Sentinel-1 SAR data to penetrate cloud is very useful for year-round monitoring, as cloud-free optical data is scarce during the winter months and often significantly impacted by topographic shadow from the low sun angle. The example below shows a characteristic winter scene, with cloud cover present and only the sunward hillslopes illuminated.