Validation of ENVISAT/SCIAMACHY columnar methane by solar FTIR spectrometry at the Ground-Truthing Station Zugspitze
Item
Title (Dublin Core)
Validation of ENVISAT/SCIAMACHY columnar methane by solar FTIR spectrometry at the Ground-Truthing Station Zugspitze
Description (Dublin Core)
Methane total-vertical column retrievals from ground-based solar FTIR measurements at the Permanent Ground-Truthing Station Zugspitze (47.42° N, 10.98° E, 2964m a.s.l.), Germany are used to validate column averaged methane retrieved from ENVISAT/SCIAMACHY spectra by WFM-DOAS (WFMD) version 0.4 and 0.41 for 153 days in 2003. Smoothing errors are estimated to be below 0.10% for FTIR and 0.14% for SCIAMACHY-WFMD retrievals and can be neglected for the assessment of observed bias and day-to-day-scatter. In order to minimize the altitude-difference effect, dry-air column averaged mixing ratios (XCH<sub>4</sub>) have been utilized. From the FTIR-time series of XCH<sub>4</sub> an atmospheric day-to-day variability of 1% was found, and a sinusoidal annual cycle with a ≈1.6% amplitude. To obtain the WFMD bias, a polynomial fitted to the FTIR series was used as a reference. The result is WFMD v0.4/FTIR=1.008±0.019 and WFMD v0.41/FTIR=1.058±0.008. WFMD v0.41 was significantly improved by a time-dependent bias correction. It can still not capture the natural day-to-day variability, i.e., the standard deviation calculated from the daily-mean values is 2.4% using averages within a 2000-km radius, and 2.7% for a 1000-km radius. These numbers are dominated by a residual time-dependent bias in the order of 3%/month. The latter can be reduced, e.g., from 2.4% to 1.6% as shown by an empirical time-dependent bias correction. Standard deviations of the daily means, calculated from the individual measurements of each day, are excluding time-dependent biases, thus showing the potential precision of WFMD daily means, i.e., 0.3% for a 2000-km selection radius, and 0.6% for a 1000-km selection radius. Therefore, the annual cycle as well as possibly the day-to-day variability could be captured under the prerequisite of further advanced time-dependent bias corrections, or the use of other channels, where the icing issue is less prominent.
Creator (Dublin Core)
Sussmann, R.
Stremme, W.
Buchwitz, M.
Beek, R.
Date (Dublin Core)
2018-06-28
Type (Dublin Core)
Text
Format (Dublin Core)
application/pdf
Identifier (Dublin Core)
10.5194/acp-5-2419-2005
https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/5/2419/2005/
Source (Dublin Core)
eISSN: 1680-7324
Language (Dublin Core)
eng
