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https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-420
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-420
26 Feb 2024
 | 26 Feb 2024

Impact of two high resolution altimetry mission concepts for ocean forecasting

Mounir Benkiran, Pierre-Yves Le Traon, Elisabeth Rémy, and Yann Drillet

Abstract. Observing System Simulation Experiments (OSSEs) with the Mercator Ocean/Copernicus Marine global 1/12° data assimilation system has been carried out to compare and quantify the expected performance of two high resolution altimetry mission concepts envisioned for the long-term evolution (post-2032) of the Copernicus Sentinel-3 topography mission. The two mission concepts are a constellation of two wide-swath altimeters and a constellation of 12 nadir altimeters. These two configurations greatly improve ocean forecasting and monitoring capabilities. Compared to a constellation of three nadir altimeters (the present configuration), analysis and forecast errors are reduced by a factor of 2. Our results also show that a constellation of two wide-swath altimeters has better performance than a constellation of 12 nadirs. Compared to a constellation of 12 nadirs, the error of the Sea Surface Height (SSH) forecast of a two wide swath constellation will be reduced by 14 % overall. Improvements are also observed when analysing surface currents and Lagrangian diagnostics. A constellation of two wide-swath altimeters thus seems to be a very promising concept for the long-term evolution of the Sentinel-3 topography mission.

Publisher's note: Copernicus Publications remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims made in the text, published maps, institutional affiliations, or any other geographical representation in this preprint. The responsibility to include appropriate place names lies with the authors.
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The assimilation of altimetry data corrects and improves the forecast of a global ocean...
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