Keeping the property system:time_start after applying a cloud mask to a Sentinel-2 level 2A collection in Google Earth Engine

Question

I am using the following collection: 'COPERNICUS/S2_SR' for a project in Google Earth Engine. I used the suggested code to mask clouds (mask2collection). However when I print some images of the collection to the console after applying the mask, each image loses most of its properties.

How can I keep the property system:time_start?

Here is an example of the code:

/**
 * Function to mask clouds using the Sentinel-2 QA band
 * @param {ee.Image} image Sentinel-2 image
 * @return {ee.Image} cloud masked Sentinel-2 image
 */
function maskS2clouds(image) {
  var qa = image.select('QA60');

  // Bits 10 and 11 are clouds and cirrus, respectively.
  var cloudBitMask = 1 << 10;
  var cirrusBitMask = 1 << 11;

  // Both flags should be set to zero, indicating clear conditions.
  var mask = qa.bitwiseAnd(cloudBitMask).eq(0)
      .and(qa.bitwiseAnd(cirrusBitMask).eq(0));

  return image.updateMask(mask).divide(10000);
}

var dataset = ee.ImageCollection('COPERNICUS/S2_SR')
                  .filterDate('2020-01-01', '2020-01-30')
                  // Pre-filter to get less cloudy granules.
                  .filter(ee.Filter.lt('CLOUDY_PIXEL_PERCENTAGE',20))
                  .map(maskS2clouds);

var visualization = {
  min: 0.0,
  max: 0.3,
  bands: ['B4', 'B3', 'B2'],
};
print(dataset.limit(50),"Collection");
Map.setCenter(83.277, 17.7009, 12);

Map.addLayer(dataset.mean(), visualization, 'RGB');

Answer 1

You can use .copyProperties() for this:

function maskS2clouds(image) {
  var qa = image.select('QA60');

  // Bits 10 and 11 are clouds and cirrus, respectively.
  var cloudBitMask = 1 << 10;
  var cirrusBitMask = 1 << 11;

  // Both flags should be set to zero, indicating clear conditions.
  var mask = qa.bitwiseAnd(cloudBitMask).eq(0)
      .and(qa.bitwiseAnd(cirrusBitMask).eq(0));

  return image.updateMask(mask).divide(10000).copyProperties(image, ['system:time_start']);
}