Achieving satellite instrument calibration for climate change

Ohring, George; Tansock, Joseph J.; Emery, William J.; Butler, James J.; Flynn, Lawrence E.; Weng, Fuzhong; Germain, Karen St.; Wielicki, Bruce A.; Cao, Changyong; Goldberg, Mitchell D.; Xiong, Jack; Fraser, Gerald T.; Kunkee, David; Winker, David M.; Miller, Laury; Ungar, Stephen; Tobin, David C.; Anderson, James G.; Pollock, David B.; Shipley, S. T.; Thurgood, Alan; Kopp, Greg; Ardanuy, Philip E.; Stone, Tom

doi:10.1029/2007eo110015

Cited by 74 publications

(84 citation statements)

References 73 publications

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“…This is further complicated by the inability, following launch, to regularly recalibrate instrumentation in any traceable manner. Establishing robust traceability in space has been identified as an essential element of any long-term strategy to improve data quality to a level where it fully meets the needs of society (see http://www.ceos.org; http://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/smcd/spb/calibration/icvs/GSICS for details and references) [3].…”

Section: (B) Earth Observation Data Qualitymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Accurate radiometry from space: an essential tool for climate studies

Fox

Kaiser-Weiss

Schmutz

et al. 2011

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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The Earth's climate is undoubtedly changing; however, the time scale, consequences and causal attribution remain the subject of significant debate and uncertainty. Detection of subtle indicators from a background of natural variability requires measurements over a time base of decades. This places severe demands on the instrumentation used, requiring measurements of sufficient accuracy and sensitivity that can allow reliable judgements to be made decades apart. The International System of Units (SI) and the network of National Metrology Institutes were developed to address such requirements. However, ensuring and maintaining SI traceability of sufficient accuracy in instruments orbiting the Earth presents a significant new challenge to the metrology community. This paper highlights some key measurands and applications driving the uncertainty demand of the climate community in the solar reflective domain, e.g. solar irradiances and reflectances/radiances of the Earth. It discusses how meeting these uncertainties facilitate significant improvement in the forecasting abilities of climate models. After discussing the current state of the art, it describes a new satellite mission, called TRUTHS, which enables, for the first time, high-accuracy SI traceability to be established in orbit. The direct use of a 'primary standard' and replication of the terrestrial traceability chain extends the SI into space, in effect realizing a 'metrology laboratory in space'.

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Section: (B) Earth Observation Data Qualitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A community workshop held in the USA in 2007 considered the needs of climate [3][4][5] and concluded that, in the optical domain, the critical underpinning measurands and the associated uncertainty requirements were:…”

Section: Introduction (A) Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Accurate radiometry from space: an essential tool for climate studies

Fox

Kaiser-Weiss

Schmutz

et al. 2011

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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“…Requirements for the generation of climate data sets (Ohring, 2007;GCOS, 2010) comprise long-term stability, reproducibility, global coverage, accuracy, resolution in Published by Copernicus Publications on behalf of the European Geosciences Union.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quantification of structural uncertainty in climate data records from GPS radio occultation

et al. 2013

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Global Positioning System (GPS) radio occultation (RO) has provided continuous observations of the Earth's atmosphere since 2001 with global coverage, all-weather capability, and high accuracy and vertical resolution in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UTLS). Precise time measurements enable long-term stability but careful processing is needed. Here we provide climate-oriented atmospheric scientists with multicenter-based results on the long-term stability of RO climatological fields for trend studies. We quantify the structural uncertainty of atmospheric trends estimated from the RO record, which arises from current processing schemes of six international RO processing centers, DMI Copenhagen, EUM Darmstadt, GFZ Potsdam, JPL Pasadena, UCAR Boulder, and WEGC Graz. Monthly-mean zonal-mean fields of bending angle, refractivity, dry pressure, dry geopotential height, and dry temperature from the CHAMP mission are compared for September 2001 to September 2008. We find that structural uncertainty is lowest in the tropics and mid-latitudes (50° S to 50° N) from 8 km to 25 km for all inspected RO variables. In this region, the structural uncertainty in trends over 7 yr is <0.03% for bending angle, refractivity, and pressure, <3 m for geopotential height of pressure levels, and <0.06 K for temperature; low enough for detecting a climate change signal within about a decade. Larger structural uncertainty above about 25 km and at high latitudes is attributable to differences in the processing schemes, which undergo continuous improvements. Though current use of RO for reliable climate trend assessment is bound to 50° S to 50° N, our results show that quality, consistency, and reproducibility are favorable in the UTLS for the establishment of a climate benchmark record

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“…A community workshop held in the USA in 2007, considered the needs of climate [4,5,6] and concluded that in the optical domain, the critical underpinning measurands (FCDRs) and the associated uncertainty requirements were: This, and their priority, was reinforced in the decadal review carried out by the National Research Council of USA [7].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Establishing a metrology lab in space to meet the demands of climate change

Fox

Green

Winkler

et al. 2015

17th International Congress of Metrology

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Le climat de la terre change, mais le taux de changement et ses effets indirects est loin de comprendre et largement débattu. Écarts de jusqu'à 5 ° c peuvent être vu entre les modèles de prévision climatique rend difficile pour les responsables politiques à prendre les mesures nécessaires pour atténuer et s'adapter à un réchauffement de la planète terre. Les observations globales de la terre par satellite sont le seul moyen de fournir la date nécessaire pour améliorer la fidélité des prévisions et en particulier de contraindre et de les tester. Ces données doivent être collectées décennies permettant aux petites tendances à être détecté issu d'un milieu de variabilité naturelle-mise des exigences sévères sur la performance des capteurs satellite. À présent peu si les satellites sont en mesure de livrer vraiment mesures traçables SI de l'orbite et zéro avec l'incertitude nécessaires pour les études climatiques à long terme, qui est proche de celle uniquement réalisables à l'aide d'étalons primaires en laboratoire. Le livre décrit une mission proposée par satellite conçue pour tirer le prima...

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Achieving satellite instrument calibration for climate change

Cited by 74 publications

References 73 publications

Accurate radiometry from space: an essential tool for climate studies

Accurate radiometry from space: an essential tool for climate studies

Quantification of structural uncertainty in climate data records from GPS radio occultation

Establishing a metrology lab in space to meet the demands of climate change

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