EUMETSAT OSI-102, OSI-102b, OSI-103, OSI-104, OSI-104b, EARS 25-km, EARS 12.5-km ASCAT Wind User Manual

Below you will find brief product information for ASCAT Wind OSI-102, ASCAT Wind OSI-102b, ASCAT Wind OSI-103, ASCAT Wind OSI-104, ASCAT Wind OSI-104b, ASCAT Wind EARS 25-km, ASCAT Wind EARS 12.5-km. ASCAT Wind OSI-102 is a 25-km resolution product with 25-km cell spacing that provides wind and soil moisture data. ASCAT Wind OSI-102b is an older version of the product with the same features but with different processing parameters. ASCAT Wind OSI-103 is a 25-km resolution product with 12.5-km cell spacing for wind data. ASCAT Wind OSI-104 and ASCAT Wind OSI-104b are 12.5-km resolution coastal wind products, available with a timeliness of approximately 1.5-2 hours from sensing time. ASCAT Wind EARS 25-km and ASCAT Wind EARS 12.5-km are regional products with a timeliness of approximately 25 minutes.

PDF

Document

ASCAT Wind Product User Manual

Ocean and Sea Ice SAF

Global OSI SAF 25-km wind product (OSI-102 and OSI-102b)

Global OSI SAF 12.5-km wind product (OSI-103)

Global OSI SAF coastal wind product (OSI-104 and OSI-104b)

Regional EARS 25-km wind product

Regional EARS 12.5-km wind product

Version 1.13

May 2013

SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/MA/126

DOCUMENT SIGNATURE TABLE

Prepared by :

Approved by :

Name

O&SI SAF Project

Team

O&SI SAF Project

Manager

Date

May 2013

Signature

DOCUMENTATION CHANGE RECORD

Issue / Revision Date :

Version 0.1

Version 1.0

Version 1.1

Version 1.2

Version 1.3

Version 1.4

Version 1.5

Version 1.6

Version 1.7

Version 1.8

Version 1.9

Version 1.10

Version 1.11

Version 1.12

Version 1.13

Feb 2007

Mar 2007

Sep 2007

Oct 2007

Mar 2008

Nov 2008

Feb 2011

Aug 2011

Feb 2012

Aug 2012

May 2013

Change :

Minor

Jan 2009 Minor

Aug 2009 Minor

Jan 2010 Minor

Major

Minor

Major

Description :

Draft version

First external version

Added release note (sec. 1.4)

Single transponder calibrated L1 data

(version 5.2.1)

Take some comments of ORR-A part 1 into account

Three-transponder calibrated L1 data

(version 5.5.0)

Change to neutral winds

Comments of 12.5-km DRI included

NetCDF product format included

Editorial changes, included section 1.7.

Included coastal product and changes for merging of soil moisture and winds

Some editorial changes

Changes for timeliness and EARS coverage

Implementation of Bayesian ice screening

Removed information which is now in the

ATBD; include Metop-B; include comments from Metop-B ORR

KNMI, De Bilt, the Netherlands

Reference: SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/MA/126

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Cover illustration: ASCAT winds over the Atlantic on 7 February 2007, around 21 hour UTC (red arrows). In this picture, only half of the ASCAT wind vectors, with 25-km cell spacing, are plotted. The blue and purple arrows show a 3-hour forecast of the winds by the KNMI High-Resolution Limited Area Model (HiRLAM). In the background, a METEOSAT infrared image is shown in black and white.

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Introduction.......................................................................................................................5

1.1.

Overview...................................................................................................................5

1.2.

Disclaimer .................................................................................................................6

1.3.

References ...............................................................................................................6

1.4.

Useful links ...............................................................................................................6

1.5.

Limitations of the ASCAT winds ...............................................................................7

1.6.

History of product changes .......................................................................................7

The ASCAT instrument.....................................................................................................9

Processing scheme ........................................................................................................10

3.1.

Backscatter averaging ............................................................................................10

3.2.

Backscatter calibration ...........................................................................................10

3.3.

NWP collocation .....................................................................................................10

3.4.

Quality control and monitoring ................................................................................11

Helpdesk, product dissemination and archive ................................................................12

Data description..............................................................................................................13

5.1.

Wind product characteristics...................................................................................13

5.2.

File formats .............................................................................................................14

Data quality.....................................................................................................................17

Glossary .........................................................................................................................19

ASCAT BUFR data descriptors ......................................................................................20

NetCDF data format .......................................................................................................22

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1. Introduction

1.1. Overview

The EUMETSAT Ocean and Sea Ice Satellite Application Facility (OSI SAF) produces a range of air-sea interface products, namely: wind, sea ice characteristics, Sea Surface

Temperatures (SST) and radiative fluxes, Surface Solar Irradiance (SSI) and Downward

Long wave Irradiance (DLI).

KNMI is involved in the OSI SAF and the EUMETSAT Advanced Retransmission Service

(EARS) ASCAT service as the centre where the Level 1b to Level 2 wind processing is carried out. This document is the Product User Manual to the ASCAT wind products. Quality monitoring information on this product and more general information on the whole OSI SAF project, is available on the OSI SAF web site: http://www.osi-saf.org/ . The user is strongly encouraged to register on this web site in order to receive the service messages and the latest information about the OSI SAF products.

The wind products are distributed in two resolutions: a 50-km resolution product with 25-km cell spacing and a 25-km resolution product with 12.5-km cell spacing. Both resolutions are available as a regional (mainly covering the Northern Hemisphere) EARS product with a timeliness of approximately 25 minutes from sensing time and as a global OSI SAF product with a timeliness of approximately 1.5-2 hours from sensing time. Moreover, a global OSI

SAF coastal product is available with 12.5-km cell spacing. The wind characteristics in full sea regions are comparable to those of the nominal 12.5-km product but additionally more wind data closer to the coast are available. At the time of writing this manual, not all products are available (yet) for Metop-B.

The scatterometer is an instrument that provides information on the wind field near the ocean surface, and scatterometry is the knowledge of extracting this information from the instrument’s output. Space-based scatterometry has become of great benefit to meteorology and climate in the past years. This is extensively described in the Algorithm Theoretical Basis

Document; see [Ref-1].

KNMI has a long experience in scatterometer processing and is developing generic software for this purpose. Processing systems have been developed for the ERS, NSCAT, SeaWinds and ASCAT scatterometers. Scatterometer processing software is developed in the

EUMETSAT Numerical Weather Prediction Satellite Application Facility (NWP SAF), whereas wind processing is performed operationally in the Ocean and Sea Ice SAF (OSI SAF) and in the EARS project.

EUMETSAT makes available near real-time Level 1b scatterometer products from the

Metop-A and -B satellites through EUMETCast (global data) and through a private network

(regional data). These products are used as basis for further processing at KNMI.

The OSI SAF and EARS products are delivered on request through the KNMI FTP server to all users and through the EUMETCast system. See also http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ for real-time graphical examples of the products and up-to-date information and documentation.

This user manual outlines user information for the OSI SAF and EARS products based on

the ASCAT scatterometer. Section 2 presents a brief description of the ASCAT instrument

and section 3 gives an overview of the data processing configuration. Section 4 provides

details on how to access the products. Detailed information on the file content and format is

given in section 5, while in section 6 the product quality is elaborated.

This manual covers the following products:

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OSI SAF ASCAT 25-km wind product (OSI-102, acronym ASCAT25, for Metop-A and -B)

OSI SAF ASCAT 12.5-km wind product (OSI-103, acronym ASCAT12), for Metop-A

OSI SAF ASCAT 12.5-km coastal wind product (OSI-104, acronym ASCAT12+), for

Metop-A and –B

EARS ASCAT 25-km wind product (acronym EARS-ASCAT-25) , for Metop-A

EARS ASCAT 12.5-km wind product (acronym EARS-ASCAT-12) , for Metop-A

Products OSI-102 and OSI-103 also contain soil moisture information over land (OSI-102 both for Metop-A and –B), the coastal and EARS products do not contain soil moisture information.

1.2. Disclaimer

All intellectual property rights of the OSI SAF and EARS products belong to EUMETSAT.

The use of these products is granted to every interested user, free of charge. If you wish to use these products, EUMETSAT's copyright credit must be shown by displaying the words

"copyright (year) EUMETSAT" on each of the products used.

The OSI SAF and EUMETSAT are much interested in receiving your feedback, would appreciate your acknowledgment in using and publishing about the data, and like to receive a copy of any publication about the application of the data. Your feedback helps us in maintaining the resources for the OSI SAF wind services.

1.3. References

[Ref-1] OSI SAF, Algorithm Theoretical Basis Document for the OSI SAF wind products,

SAF/OSI/CDOP2/KNMI/SCI/MA/197 (*)

[Ref-2] Verhoef, A., and A. Stoffelen, ASCAT coastal winds validation report, OSI SAF

Report, SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/RP/176, 2011 (*)

[Ref-3] Verhoef, A., M. Portabella and A. Stoffelen, High-resolution ASCAT scatterometer winds near the coast, IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing,

2012, 50, 7, 2481-2487, doi:10.1109/TGRS.2011.2175001

[Ref-4] Verspeek, J., M. Portabella, A. Stoffelen and A. Verhoef, ASCAT Calibration and

Validation, OSI SAF Technical Report, SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/TN/163 (*)

[Ref-5] Verspeek, J., A. Verhoef and A. Stoffelen, ASCAT-B NWP Ocean Calibration and

Validation, OSI SAF Technical Report, SAF/OSI/CDOP2/KNMI/TEC/RP/199, 2013

(*)

[Ref-6] EUMETSAT, ASCAT Level 1 Product Generation Function Specification,

EUM.EPS.SYS.SPE.990009

[Ref-7] Thesis “Scatterometry” by Ad Stoffelen, 1998 (*)

[Ref-8] ADDITIONS TO BUFR/CREX TABLES FOR PRE-OPERATIONAL

IMPLEMENTATION ENDORSED BY CBS for full operational status on 7 November

2007 (updated 04/01/07), pp55-60, available on http://www.wmo.int/web/www/WMOCodes/Updates/BUFRCREX/Preoperational050107.doc

References marked with a (*) are available on http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/publications/ .

KNMI scatterometer web site: http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/

- Information on OSI SAF activities at KNMI: http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/osisaf/

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- Information on EARS activities at KNMI: http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ears/

- ASCAT visual products: http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ascat_osi_25_prod/ , http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ascat_osi_12_prod/ , http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ascat_osi_co_prod/ , http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ascat_ear_25_prod/ , http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ascat_ear_12_prod/ , http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ascat_b_osi_25_prod/ , http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ascat_b_osi_co_prod/

Information on EARS and EUMETCast: http://www.eumetsat.int/

O&SI SAF wind product documentation on http://www.osi-saf.org/ :

- Scientific documents

- Technical documents

NWP SAF website: http://www.nwpsaf.org/

EUMETSAT ASCAT documentation: http://www.eumetsat.int/Home/Main/Satellites/Metop/Instruments/SP_2010053161611647?l=en

EUMETSAT ASCAT product guide: http://oiswww.eumetsat.org/WEBOPS/eps-pg/ASCAT/ASCAT-PG-index.htm

The following restrictions and limitations hold:

1) Although the Level 1 product is fully calibrated now using three transponders on the ground, the backscatter values are corrected using a calibration table, derived from a geophysical wind model. The backscatter values in the Level 2 wind product are however plain copies of those in the Level 1 product. The corrections are very small and expected to be incorporated into a new version of the Geophysical Model Function.

2) The backscatter data and noise values (K

) in the coastal product are computed as part of the level 2 wind processing and they are not scientifically validated, other than by validation of the wind retrieval properties in the coastal products.

3) The provision of the full resolution ASCAT backscatter product from EUMETSAT to KNMI, which is necessary for the coastal wind product processing, is not considered an operational process. Hence the coastal wind product can not have a fully operational status.

These restrictions and limitations are subject to further study.

1.6. History of product changes

Here is an historical overview of the changes in the ASCAT wind products:

28-Mar-2007 OSI SAF ASCAT 25-km demonstration wind product available on

EUMETCast. ASCAT Wind Data Processor software version is 1_0i.

23-May-2007 Processing transferred to operational KNMI server.

10-Oct-2007 AWDP version 1_0k: adapted to the improved calibration of the Level 1 product. Wind product status is pre-operational now.

12-Dec-2007 AWDP version 1_0l: OSI SAF ASCAT 25-km winds are available on the GTS.

18-Mar-2008 AWDP version 1_0_13: adapted to the three-transponder calibration of the

Level 1 product.

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20-Nov-2008 AWDP version 1_0_15: change to neutral winds (0.2 m/s added to the wind speeds) and improved calibration of the level 1 product (activated at 2

December).

03-Dec-2008 OSI SAF ASCAT 25-km wind product has the operational status.

11-Dec-2008 EARS ASCAT 25-km and 12.5-km winds are available to all users.

03-Mar-2009 OSI SAF ASCAT 12.5-km wind product is available with the operational status.

21-Apr-2009 AWDP version 1_0_17: upgrades in BUFR encoding.

01-Sep-2009 AWDP version 1_0_18: wind products are available in NetCDF now on the

KNMI FTP server.

08-Sep-2009 EARS ASCAT data are available on the GTS.

12-Jan-2010 AWDP version 1_0_19: products in BUFR Edition 4 and up to four wind solutions present in 25-km BUFR products.

02-Feb-2010 OSI-SAF products disseminated on EUMETCast are also available to users in

Africa and the Americas now.

28-Feb-2011 Both wind and soil moisture information are available in a multi-parameter

BUFR product.

16-Aug-2011 AWDP version 2_1_00: up to four wind solutions present in the 12.5-km and coastal BUFR products, use of NWP Ocean Calibration for more uniform wind characteristics across the swath.

23-Aug-2011 AHRPT data from a number of ground stations are now available in addition to the EARS ASCAT data acquired at Svalbard.

18-Sep-2012 Implementation of Bayesian ice screening.

14-Nov-2012 First development version of ASCAT-B 25-km and coastal global wind products. AWDP version is 2_1_01.

14-May-2013 AWDP version 2_2_00: preparation for level 1b data format change.

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2. The ASCAT instrument

The Advanced SCATterometer (ASCAT) is one of the instruments carried on-board the

Meteorological Operational (Metop) polar satellites launched by the European Space Agency

(ESA) and operated by the EUropean organisation for the exploitation of METeorological

SATellites (EUMETSAT). Metop-A, the first in a series of three satellites, was launched on 19

October 2006, Metop-B was launched on 17 September 2012. Metop-C is planned to be launched approximately in 2017.

ASCAT is a real aperture radar using vertically polarised antennas. It transmits a long pulse with Linear Frequency Modulation (‘chirp’). Ground echoes are received by the instrument and, after de-chirping, the backscattered signal is spectrally analysed and detected. In the power spectrum, frequency can be mapped into slant range provided the chirp rate and the

Doppler frequency are known. The above processing is in effect a pulse compression, which provides range resolution.

Two sets of three antennas are used to generate radar beams looking 45 degrees forward, sideways, and 45 degrees backwards with respect to the satellite's flight direction, on both sides of the satellite ground track. These beams illuminate approximately 550 km-wide swaths (separated by about 700 km) as the satellite moves along its orbit, and each provide measurements of radar backscatter from the sea surface on a 25 km or 12.5 km grid, i.e. each swath is divided into 21 or 41 so-called Wind Vector Cells (WVCs). This brings the effective swath width to 525 km (21x25) or 512.5 km (41x12.5) for the 25-km and 12.5-km products, respectively. For each WVC, we obtain three independent backscatter measurements using the three different viewing directions and separated by a short time delay. As the backscatter depends on the sea surface roughness as a function of the wind speed and direction at the ocean surface, it is possible to calculate the surface wind speed and direction by using these 'triplets' within a mathematical model.

The instrument operates at a frequency of 5.255 GHz (C-band), which makes it rather insensitive to rain.

Figure 1: ASCAT wind scatterometer geometry (source:

EUMETSAT web site).

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3. Processing scheme

KNMI has a processing chain running in near real-time with ASCAT data, including visualisation on the internet. This processor is based on the NWP SAF software and runs in the KNMI operational environment. The processing includes monitoring and archiving functionalities. A brief overview of the modules of the ASCAT scatterometer processor is given below. General information about the scatterometer wind processing algorithms can be

found in the ATBD [Ref-1].

In this step, which is performed only for the coastal product, the full resolution ASCAT level 1 product is used to re-compute backscatter values (

0 s) in the Wind Vector Cells. The full resolution backscatter data are averaged using a spatial box filter rather than the Hamming filter that is used in the spatial averaging of the

0 s of the nominal level 1 products. All full resolution

0 s within 15 km from the Wind Vector Cell centre are used in the averaging

0 s are

[Ref-2]. Moreover, in Wind Vector Cells close to the coast, only those full resolution

used that are entirely over sea. As the position of the averaged the positions of the full resolution

is an averaged value of

0 s, the coastal Wind Vector Cell is slightly displaced away from the coast. On the other hand, it is possible to compute winds as close as ~15 km from the coast, while in the nominal 12.5-km product, Wind Vector Cells closer than ~35 km from

the coast are flagged because of land contamination. See [Ref-2] and [Ref-3] for more

information on the coastal product.

The backscatter values in the Level 1 product are calibrated by adding a WVC and beam dependent bias in dB to the incoming

0 s. The calibration table was obtained by fitting the

actual measurements to the theoretical GMF function. More details are provided in [Ref-4] and [Ref-5]. Note that the calibrated backscatter values are only available within the wind

processing software; the

data in the wind product are identical to those in the Level 1 product.

KNMI receives NWP model data from ECMWF twice a day through the RMDCN.

NWP model sea surface temperature (SST) data are used to support the Bayesian sea ice

discrimination [Ref-1]. The SST values of the four surrounding model grid points around the

WVC location are bilinearly interpolated. Note that the ECMWF model data do not contain

SST values over land; if one or more of the four surrounding grid points has missing SST data, the SST value of the grid point closest to the WVC is taken. WVCs with a sea surface temperature above 5 °C are assumed to be always open water. The ice screening procedure may sometimes assign rainy WVCs erroneous as ice; using the extra SST criterion, WVCs in warmer areas will never be labelled as ice. Due to its rather high threshold value, the NWP

SST ice screening will only be active in regions far away from the ice extents.

Land presence within each WVC is determined by using the land-sea mask available from the model data. The weighted mean value of the land fractions of all model grid points within

80 km of the WVC centre is calculated. The weight of each grid point scales with 1/r

, where r is the distance between the WVC centre and the model grid point. If this mean land fraction value exceeds a threshold of 0.02, no wind retrieval is performed. Also the land fractions present in the beam information in the level 1b product are considered: if any land fraction in the fore, mid or aft beam exceeds 0.02, no wind retrieval is performed.

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NWP forecast wind data are necessary in the ambiguity removal step of the processing.

Wind forecasts are available twice a day (00 and 12 GMT analysis time) with forecast time steps of +3h, +6h, …, +36h. The model wind data are linearly interpolated with respect to

time and location and put into the level 2 information part of each WVC (see section 5.2).

Note that the ECMWF winds stored in the wind products are real winds rather than neutral winds.

3.4. Quality control and monitoring

In each WVC, the

data is checked for quality and completeness and the inversion

residual (see [Ref-1]) is checked. Degraded WVCs are flagged; see section 5.2 for more

details.

An information file is made for each product. The content of the file is identical whatever the product and results from a compilation of all the global information concerning this product.

From these files, various graphs are produced to visually display the confidence levels of the products and their evolution with time. These graphs are available in near-real time if you click on the ‘Monitoring information’ link on the product visualisation web pages. Data quality

is also available to the users within the products; see section 5 and 6 for a description of

quality flags.

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4. Helpdesk, product dissemination and archive

For a swift response management procedure, user requests on the OSI SAF data products should be issued at the Ocean and Sea Ice SAF website ( http://www.osi-saf.org/ ). User requests on the EARS products can be sent to [email protected]

. User requests on the Soil

Moisture content in the products can be sent to [email protected]

The ASCAT BUFR L2 products are disseminated on EUMETCast. Please consult http://www.eumetsat.int/ , under ‘Access to Data’ for more information on EUMETCast dissemination and how to receive these and other EUMETSAT meteorological satellite products, or contact [email protected]

The BUFR and NetCDF products are also made available on a password-protected ftp site.

This password is provided to new users by Email request. Please send your requests to [email protected]

The Metop-A ASCAT 25-km global winds in BUFR format are disseminated on the GTS. The messages are distributed to the Exeter node and can be identified by: header (T1T2A1A2ii) =

ISXX[01-06]; CCCC = EHDB. The coastal winds are available on the GTS with identification header (T1T2A1A2ii) = ISXX[11-16]; CCCC = EHDB. The EARS Metop-A ASCAT winds are also available on the GTS with identification header (T1T2A1A2ii) = ISXN[01-06]; CCCC =

EHDB (25-km) and header (T1T2A1A2ii) = ISXN[11-16]; CCCC = EHDB (12.5-km).

A BUFR reader is available at www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/bufr_reader/ .

The OSI SAF Metop-A ASCAT data are archived in the EUMETSAT Data Centre Archive, see http://www.eumetsat.int/Home/Main/DataAccess/EUMETSATDataCentre/index.htm?l=en

(BUFR and NetCDF). For data not (yet) present in the EUMETSAT Data Centre, KNMI also keeps an off line archive of the global products. You can send a request to [email protected]

The OSI SAF Metop-A ASCAT data in NetCDF are also archived in the NASA Physical

Oceanography Distributed Active Archive Center (PO.DAAC) archive, see http://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov/datasetlist?ids=Sensor&values=ASCAT&search= .

The ASCAT 25-km global winds can be explored through the Enhanced Satellite Archive

Dataminer Naiad: http://www.naiad.fr/

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5. Data description

5.1. Wind product characteristics

Physical definition

Horizontal equivalent neutral wind vector at 10 m height (see [Ref-1]).

Units and range

Wind speed is measured in m/s. The wind speed range is from 0-50 m/s, but wind speeds

over 25 m/s are generally less reliable [Ref-1]. In the BUFR products, the wind direction is in

meteorological (WMO) convention relative to North: 0 degrees corresponds to a wind flowing to the South with a clockwise increment. In the NetCDF products, the wind direction is in

oceanographic convention: 0 degrees corresponds to a wind flowing to the North with a clockwise increment.

Input satellite data

The generation of ASCAT level 1b data by EUMETSAT is described in their technical

documentation [Ref-6]. The global ASCAT data are acquired in Svalbard (Norway) and

transmitted to the EUMETSAT central processing facilities in Darmstadt, where they are processed up to level 1b. Regional EARS data are acquired at Svalbard and other ground stations, processed up to level 1b and then transmitted to KNMI via a dedicated private network. The product contains geo-located measurement triplets on a satellite swath WVC grid of 25 km or 12.5 km size.

Geographical definition

The Metop satellite flies in a near-polar sun synchronous orbit at 98 degrees inclination at approximately 800 km orbit height. The two satellite swaths are located to the left and to the right of the satellite ground track. The swath width is either 21 25-km size WVCs, corresponding to 525 km or 41 12.5-km size WVCs, corresponding to 512.5 km. Products are organised in rows of 42 or 82 WVCs, respectively.

Coverage

The OSI SAF products have global coverage. For the ascending Metop-A tracks, the EARS data correspond to the last 30 minutes of the X-band data dump when the satellite passes the Svalbard ground station. For the descending tracks, also AHRPT data from several ground stations are used, adding coverage in the European seas and Atlantic and Indian oceans. An up-to-date list of ground stations in use is available on http://www.eumetsat.int/Home/Main/Satellites/GroundNetwork/EARSSystem/EARS-

ASCAT/index.htm?l=en . Actual wind coverage is available on the OSI SAF and EARS

ASCAT product visualisation websites (see http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ ).

Output product

The input product in BUFR is processed into a BUFR output product including a unique wind solution (chosen), its corresponding ambiguous wind solutions and quality information

(distance to cone, quality flag). The products contain up to four wind solutions. The products

are also available in NetCDF format; see section 9 for more details.

Delivery time

A wind product is available for distribution within 10 minutes after the input product reception at KNMI. For the global product, the delivery time between acquisition of the data and availability for the user ranges from 40 to 120 minutes. The regional product is available within 25 minutes after data acquisition. Timeliness statistics are available on the product visualisation websites, after clicking on the ‘Monitoring information’ link.

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Expected accuracy

The expected accuracy is defined as the expected bias and standard deviation of the primary calculations. The accuracy is validated against in situ wind measurements from buoys, platforms, or ship, and against NWP data. Even better, the errors of all NWP model winds, in

situ data, and scatterometer winds are computed in a triple collocation exercise [Ref-7]. The

performance is pretty constant over the globe and depends mainly on the sub footprint wind variability. The performance of the products issued by the OSI SAF and EARS is characterised by a wind component RMS error smaller than 2 m/s and a bias of less than

0.5 m/s in wind speed.

Wind products are in BUFR Edition 4 or in NetCDF format. A complete description of BUFR can be found in WMO publication No 306, Manual on Codes. The graphical displays of the wind products are available and explained on the web: see the links on http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ .

The file name convention for the Level 2 BUFR product is ascat_YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS_SAT_ORBIT_SRV_T_SMPL(_CONT).l2_bufr, where

ascat denotes the instrument

YYYYMMDD denotes the date of the first data in the file

HHMMSS denotes the time (UTC) of the first data in the file

SAT denotes the satellite name: metopa or metopb

ORBIT is the orbit number (00000-99999)

SRV is the service (eps for global OSI SAF or ear for regional EARS)

T is the processing type (o for operational, t for test)

SMPL is the WVC sampling (cell spacing): 250 or 125, or coa for the coastal product which has a WVC spacing of 12.5 km, as well.

CONT (optional field) refers to the product contents: ovw for a product containing only

Ocean Vector Winds and no soil moisture information, CONT is omitted if the product contains both winds and soil moisture.

l2_bufr (l is the lowercase L) denotes Level 2 product in BUFR

Examples of file names are ascat_20070213_021503_metopa_01653_eps_t_250.l2_bufr for a global test product containing soil moisture information, or ascat_20070213_021503_metopa_01653_ear_o_125_ovw.l2_bufr for a regional operational product containing no soil moisture information.

The wind product is stored in the BUFR format as proposed for ASCAT and described in

[Ref-8], a list of descriptors (fields) contained in each WVC is provided in section 8.

The BUFR data contain three main sections: level 1 information (fields 1-62), level 2 Soil

Moisture information (fields 63-82) and level 2 wind information (fields 83 and up). The L1 information is simply copied into the L2 data, except for the coastal product, where the backscatter data are recalculated based on the data in the ASCAT full resolution level 1

product [Ref-3]. More information on the L1 data can be found in the EUMETSAT ASCAT

Product Guide, see the link in section 1.4. The Soil Moisture data are produced by and under

the responsibility of the EUMETSAT central facilities. The coastal product does not contain

Soil Moisture information since it contains recalculated backscatter information which is not

OSI SAF/EARS ASCAT Wind Product User Manual version 1.13 May 2013 14

SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/MA/126 input to the Soil Moisture computations. In this way, inconsistency between the backscatter data and Soil Moisture in one product is avoided.

Field 2 (‘Identification of originating/generating sub-centre’) is set to 0 for OSI SAF products.

For EARS products, a value of 1 refers to X-band data dumps from Svalbard, whereas other values refer to AHRPT ground stations. For a list of ground stations, see http://www.eumetsat.int/Home/Main/Satellites/GroundNetwork/EARSSystem/EARS-

ASCAT/index.htm?l=en .

Field 84 (‘Generating Application’) contains the value 91 which means that first guess model winds are used for ambiguity removal. The interpolated model winds are in the fields 85-86.

The Wind Vector Cell Quality Flag (field 89, table 021155) has the following definitions:

Description

Not enough good sigma-0 available for wind retrieval

Poor azimuth diversity among sigma-0 for wind retrieval

Any beam noise content above threshold

Product monitoring not used

Product monitoring flag

KNMI quality control fails

Variational quality control fails

Some portion of wind vector cell is over land

Some portion of wind vector cell is over ice

Wind inversion not successful for wind vector cell

Reported wind speed is greater than 30 m/s

Reported wind speed is less than or equal to 3 m/s

Rain flag for the wind vector cell is not usable

Rain flag algorithm detects rain

No meteorological background used

Data are redundant

Distance to GMF too large

BUFR bit Fortran bit

1 22

Missing value All 24 set All 24 set

In Fortran, if the Wind Vector Cell Quality is stored in an integer I then use BTEST(I,NDW-

NB-1) to test BUFR bit NB, where NDW=24 is the width in bits of the data element in BUFR.

If the ‘monitoring not used’ bit (BUFR bit 4) is set to zero, the product is monitored. If the product is monitored and the ‘monitoring flag’ bit (BUFR bit 5) is set to zero, the product is

valid; otherwise it is rejected by the monitoring, see [Ref-1]. The monitoring bits are set to the

same value in all WVCs in one BUFR output file.

If the KNMI QC flag (BUFR bit 6) is set in a WVC this means that the backscatter information is of poor quality for various reasons, such as a too large inversion residual, or a too high noise value in the input product. WVCs, in which the KNMI QC flag is set, are not used in the calculation of the analysis field in the ambiguity removal step. However, after the ambiguity removal the wind solution closest to the analysis field is chosen (if wind solutions are present in the WVC). This means that such a WVC may contain a selected wind solution, but it is suspect.

Land presence flag is set if a land fraction (see section 3.3) larger than zero is calculated for

the WVC. As long as the land fraction is below the limit value, a reliable wind solution may however still be present so there is normally no reason to reject WVCs with the land flag set.

Ice presence flag is set if the Bayesian sea ice screening algorithm calculates ice for the

WVC (see [Ref-1]). Note that the products contain wind solutions also over sea ice regions.

These bogus winds are flagged both by the KNMI quality control flag and by the ice flag.

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SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/MA/126

Hence it is important that you reject any winds with the KNMI quality control flag set when ingesting the products. Note that WVCs that are rejected due to a large inversion residual

(e.g., in case of rain), only have the KNMI quality control flag set. On the other hand, WVCs that are rejected due to sea ice, have both the KNMI quality control flag and the ice flag set.

If the variational QC flag is set, the wind vector in the WVC is rejected during ambiguity removal due to spatial inconsistency. A wind solution is present, but it may be suspect.

It is recommended not to use WVCs with the monitoring flag, the KNMI quality control flag or

the variational quality control flag set. See [Ref-1] for more information on product reliability.

The ‘likelihood computed for solution’ (descriptor 021104) actually contains the log

of the calculated likelihood for the wind solution. This is done since otherwise values close to zero will be rounded to zero in the BUFR encoding. In order to recalculate the probability, the user should compute 10 to the power <value from BUFR>.

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6. Data quality

As introduced in section 5.1, the accuracy should be better than 2 m/s in wind component

RMS with a bias of less than 0.5 m/s in wind speed.

Collocation result - speed (977034 wind vectors) Collocation result - direction (821351 wind vectors)

Model wind speed (m/s)

Collocation result - u (977140 wind vectors)

Model wind direction (deg)

Collocation result - v (977104 wind vectors)

Figure 2:

Contoured histograms of the

25-km ASCAT wind product from

Metop-A (top) and

Metop-B (bottom) vs. ECMWF model

forecast winds.

Model u component (m/s)

Histogram - speed

Model v component (m/s)

Histogram - direction

Collocation result - speed (966770 wind vectors)

Model wind speed (m/s)

Collocation result - u (966859 wind vectors)

Collocation result - direction (811903 wind vectors)

Model wind direction (deg)

Collocation result - v (966850 wind vectors)

Model u component (m/s)

Histogram - speed

Model v component (m/s)

Histogram - direction

Figure 2 shows two-dimensional histograms of the retrieved winds versus ECMWF 10m wind

background for the 25-km wind product, with the backscatter calibration (see section 3.2)

applied. The data for these plots are from consecutive Metop-A and Metop-B orbits from 1 and 2 November 2012 (28 orbits from both satellites).

The top left plots correspond to wind speed (bins of 0.5 m/s) and the top right plots to wind direction (bins of 2.5°). The latter are computed for ECMWF winds larger than 4 m/s. The bottom plots show the u and v wind component statistics (bins of 0.5 m/s).

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From these results, it is clear that the spread in the distributions is small. The wind speed biases are quite small, ~0.20 m/s. We obtain wind component standard deviations of 1.44 in

u and 1.49 in v directions, both for Metop-A and Metop-B. Note that the data in the plots do not include WVCs that are quality controlled, i.e. have a too large inversion residual.

Collocation result - speed (6256 wind vectors) Collocation result - direction (5531 wind vectors)

Buoy wind speed (m/s)

Collocation result - u (6257 wind vectors)

Buoy wind direction (deg)

Collocation result - v (6257 wind vectors)

Figure 3:

Contoured histograms of the

25-km ASCAT wind product from

Metop-A (top) and

Metop-B (bottom) vs. in situ buoy

winds.

Buoy u component (m/s)

Histogram - speed

Buoy v component (m/s)

Histogram - direction

Collocation result - speed (6278 wind vectors) Collocation result - direction (5559 wind vectors)

Buoy wind speed (m/s)

Collocation result - u (6280 wind vectors)

Buoy wind direction (deg)

Collocation result - v (6280 wind vectors)

Buoy u component (m/s)

Histogram - speed

Buoy v component (m/s)

Histogram - direction

Figure 3 shows the results of collocations of ASCAT winds from Metop-A and Metop-B with buoy winds. These results cover the period of November 2012 to January 2013 (3 months).

For more details about the collocation method, please see [Ref-4] and [Ref-5]. We find a

wind speed bias of -0.02 m/s for Metop-A and 0.05 m/s for Metop-B. Standard deviations of u and v wind components are 1.72 m/s and 1.76 m/s for Metop-A and 1.78 m/s and 1.80 m/s for Metop-B, respectively. These figures are all well within the OSI SAF requirements.

More validation information can be found in [Ref-4] and [Ref-5].

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7. Glossary

AR Ambiguity

BUFR

EARS

EPS

ERS

Binary Universal Format Representation

EUMETSAT Advanced Retransmission Service

EUMETSAT Polar System

European Remote-Sensing Satellite

EUMETCast EUMETSAT’s Digital Video Broadcast Data Distribution System

EUMETSAT European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites

HDF

JPL

KNMI

Metop

NASA

NetCDF

NOAA

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (NASA)

Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute

Meteorological operational satellite

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (USA)

Network Common Data Form

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (USA)

NWP

OSI SAF

Numerical Weather Prediction

Ocean and Sea Ice SAF

PO.DAAC Physical Oceanography Distributed Active Archive Center

QC Quality

QuikSCAT USA dedicated scatterometer mission

RMDCN Regional Meteorological Data Communication Network

SAF Satellite Application Facility

SeaWinds Scatterometer on-board QuikSCAT platform (USA)

SM Soil

SOS

SST

WVC

Scatterometer Ocean Stress

Sea Surface Temperature

West-to-east wind component

South-to-north wind component

Wind Vector Cell

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8. ASCAT BUFR data descriptors

Number Descriptor Parameter

1 001033 Identification Of Originating/Generating Centre

001007

002019

001012

006001

005033

006034

010095

021157

021150

008085

002111

002134

OSI SAF/EARS

021063

021158

021159

021160

021161

021162

021163

021164

021165

021166

008085

002111

002134

021063

021158

021159

021160

021161

021162

021163

021164

021165

021166

008085

002111

002134

Satellite Identifier

Satellite Instruments

Direction Of Motion Of Moving Observing Platform

Longitude (High Accuracy)

Pixel Size On Horizontal-1

Cross Track Cell Number

Height Of Atmosphere Used

Loss Per Unit Length Of Atmosphere Used

Beam Collocation

Beam Identifier

Radar Incidence Angle

Antenna Beam Azimuth

Radiometric Resolution (Noise Value)

ASCAT Kp Estimate Quality

ASCAT Sigma-0 Usability

ASCAT Use Of Synthetic Data

ASCAT Synthetic Data Quality

ASCAT Satellite Orbit And Attitude Quality

ASCAT Solar Array Reflection Contamination

ASCAT Telemetry Presence And Quality

ASCAT Extrapolated Reference Function

ASCAT Land Fraction

Beam Identifier

Radar Incidence Angle

Antenna Beam Azimuth

Radiometric Resolution (Noise Value)

ASCAT Kp Estimate Quality

ASCAT Sigma-0 Usability

ASCAT Use Of Synthetic Data

ASCAT Synthetic Data Quality

ASCAT Satellite Orbit And Attitude Quality

ASCAT Solar Array Reflection Contamination

ASCAT Telemetry Presence And Quality

ASCAT Extrapolated Reference Function

ASCAT Land Fraction

Beam Identifier

Radar Incidence Angle

Antenna Beam Azimuth

Numeric

Code Table

Degree

Degree dB

Code Table

Numeric

Unit

Code Table

Numeric

Code Table

Degree True

Year

Month

Day

Hour

Minute

Second

Degree

Degree m

Numeric

Numeric m dB/m

Flag Table

Code Table

Degree

Degree dB

Code Table

Numeric

Code Table

Degree

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SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/MA/126

Number Descriptor Parameter

021063

021158

021159

021160

021161

021162

021163

021164

021165

021166

Radiometric Resolution (Noise Value)

ASCAT Kp Estimate Quality

ASCAT Sigma-0 Usability

ASCAT Use Of Synthetic Data

ASCAT Synthetic Data Quality

ASCAT Satellite Orbit And Attitude Quality

ASCAT Solar Array Reflection Contamination

ASCAT Telemetry Presence And Quality

ASCAT Extrapolated Reference Function

ASCAT Land Fraction

Unit

Code Table

Numeric

040001

040002

021151

021152

021153

021154

040003

040004

040005

040006

040008

040009

001032

011082

011081

020096

021155

021101

021102

031001

011012

011011

021104

011012

011011

Surface Soil Moisture (Ms)

Estimated Error In Surface Soil Moisture

Estimated Error In Sigma0 At 40 Deg Incidence Angle

Slope At 40 Deg Incidence Angle

Estimated Error In Slope At 40 Deg Incidence Angle

Soil Moisture Sensitivity

Mean Surface Soil Moisture

Rain Fall Detection

Soil Moisture Correction Flag

Soil Moisture Processing Flag

Frozen Land Surface Fraction

Inundation And Wetland Fraction

Generating Application

Model Wind Speed At 10 m

Model Wind Direction At 10 m

Ice Age (A-Parameter)

Wind Vector Cell Quality

Number Of Vector Ambiguities

Index Of Selected Wind Vector

Delayed Descriptor Replication Factor

Wind Speed At 10 m

Wind Direction At 10 m

Likelihood Computed For Solution

Wind Speed At 10 m

Wind Direction At 10 m

% dB dB dB/Degree dB/Degree dB dB dB

Numeric

Flag Table

Numeric

Code Table m/s

Degree True

Numeric dB

Flag Table

Numeric

Numeric m/s

Degree True

Numeric

Numeric m/s

Degree True

Numeric

Numeric 100 021104 Likelihood Computed For Solution

Note that descriptor numbers 93-96 can be repeated 1 to 144 times, depending on the value of the Delayed Descriptor Replication Factor (descriptor number 92)

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9. NetCDF data format

The ASCAT wind products are also available in the NetCDF format, with the following characteristics:

The data are organised in full orbits rather than in 3-minute granules.

The data format meets the NetCDF Climate and Forecast Metadata Convention version

1.4 ( http://cf-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ ).

The data contain, contrary to the BUFR data, only Level 2 wind and sea ice information, no sigma0 nor soil moisture information. The aim was to create a compact and easy to handle product for oceanographic and climatological users.

The data contain only the selected wind solutions, no ambiguity information.

The wind directions are in oceanographic rather than meteorological convention (see

section 5.1)

The format is usable for ASCAT, ERS, QuikSCAT and any other scatterometer data.

The data has file sizes comparable to those of the corresponding BUFR data (e.g., one orbit of ASCAT 25-km wind data is 2.6 MB in BUFR and 2.2 MB in NetCDF). When compressed with gzip, the size of one orbit in NetCDF reduces to ~820 kB.

The NetCDF data in near real-time are only available on the KNMI FTP server, but

EUMETCast dissemination can be considered on user request.

The file name convention for the gzipped NetCDF product is ascat_YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS_SAT_ORBIT_SRV_T_SMPL_VERS(_CONT).l2.nc.gz where

the meaning of the fields is identical to those in the BUFR file names (see section 5.2). Note

that in NetCDF the SRV is always “eps” (global data) and the CONT is always “ovw” (Ocean

Vector Winds). The VERS part of the file name denotes the software version. A file name example is: ascat_20090826_051502_metopa_14797_eps_o_250_1018_ovw.l2.nc.gz

Below are some meta data contained in the NetCDF data files: dimensions:

NUMROWS = 1581 ;

NUMCELLS = 42 ; variables:

int time(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

time:long_name = "time" ;

time:units = "seconds since 1990-01-01 00:00:00" ;

int lat(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

lat:long_name = "latitude" ;

lat:units = "degrees_north" ;

int lon(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

lon:long_name = "longitude" ;

lon:units = "degrees_east" ;

short wvc_index(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

wvc_index:long_name = "cross track wind vector cell number" ;

wvc_index:units = "1" ;

short model_speed(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

model_speed:long_name = "model wind speed at 10 m" ;

model_speed:units = "m s-1" ;

short model_dir(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

model_dir:long_name = "model wind direction at 10 m" ;

model_dir:units = "degree" ;

short ice_prob(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

ice_prob:long_name = "ice probability" ;

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SAF/OSI/CDOP/KNMI/TEC/MA/126

ice_prob:units = "1" ;

short ice_age(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

ice_age:long_name = "ice age (a-parameter)" ;

ice_age:units = "dB" ;

int wvc_quality_flag(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

wvc_quality_flag:long_name = "wind vector cell quality" ;

wvc_quality_flag:flag_masks = 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, 4096,

8192, 16384, 32768, 65536, 131072, 262144, 524288, 1048576, 2097152, 4194304 ;

wvc_quality_flag:flag_meanings = "distance_to_gmf_too_large data_are_redundant no_meteorological_background_used rain_detected rain_flag_not_usable small_wind_less_than_or_equal_to_3_m_s large_wind_greater_than_30_m_s wind_inversion_not_successful some_portion_of_wvc_is_over_ice some_portion_of_wvc_is_over_land variational_quality_control_fails knmi_quality_control_fails product_monitoring_event_flag product_monitoring_not_used any_beam_noise_content_above_threshold poor_azimuth_diversity not_enough_good_sigma0_for_wind_retrieval" ;

short wind_speed(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

wind_speed:long_name = "wind speed at 10 m" ;

wind_speed:units = "m s-1" ;

short wind_dir(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

wind_dir:long_name = "wind direction at 10 m" ;

wind_dir:units = "degree" ;

short bs_distance(NUMROWS, NUMCELLS) ;

bs_distance:long_name = "backscatter distance" ;

bs_distance:units = "1" ;

// global attributes:

:title = "MetOp-A ASCAT Level 2 25.0 km Ocean Surface Wind Vector Product" ;

:title_short_name = "ASCAT-L2-25km" ;

:Conventions = "CF-1.4" ;

:institution = "EUMETSAT/OSI SAF/KNMI" ;

:source = "MetOp-A ASCAT" ;

:software_identification_level_1 = 702 ;

:instrument_calibration_version = 0 ;

:software_identification_wind = 1018 ;

:pixel_size_on_horizontal = "25.0 km" ;

:service_type = "eps" ;

:processing_type = "O" ;

:contents = "ovw" ;

:granule_name = "ascat_20090826_051502_metopa_14797_eps_o_250_1018_ovw.l2.nc" ;

:processing_level = "L2" ;

:orbit_number = 14797 ;

:start_date = "2009-08-26" ;

:start_time = "05:15:02" ;

:stop_date = "2009-08-26" ;

:stop_time = "06:53:56" ;

:equator_crossing_longitude = " 244.606" ;

:equator_crossing_date = "2009-08-26" ;

:equator_crossing_time = "05:12:26" ;

:rev_orbit_period = "6081.7" ;

:orbit_inclination = "98.7" ;

:history = "N/A" ;

:references = "ASCAT Wind Product User Manual, http://www.osi-saf.org/, http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/" ;

:comment = "Orbit period and inclination are constant values. All wind directions in oceanographic convention (0 deg. flowing North)" ;

:creation_date = "2009-08-26" ;

:creation_time = "08:31:31" ;

OSI SAF/EARS ASCAT Wind Product User Manual version 1.13 May 2013 23

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Key features

25-km and 12.5-km resolutions
Global and regional coverage
Wind and soil moisture data
Near real-time delivery
High accuracy
BUFR and NetCDF formats

Frequently asked questions

There are global and regional products available in different resolutions: 25-km and 12.5-km. Some products provide wind and soil moisture information, while others provide only wind data. There are also coastal wind products available with 12.5-km cell spacing.

The global products are available within 1.5-2 hours from sensing time, while the regional products are available within 25 minutes.

The expected accuracy is defined as the expected bias and standard deviation of the primary calculations. The performance is characterized by a wind component RMS error smaller than 2 m/s and a bias of less than 0.5 m/s in wind speed.

The products are available in BUFR Edition 4 or in NetCDF format.

You can find more information on the OSI SAF website: http://www.osi-saf.org/ and on the KNMI scatterometer website: http://www.knmi.nl/scatterometer/ .

The ASCAT Wind products can be accessed through the KNMI FTP server, the EUMETCast system, and the GTS. You can also access the products through the EUMETSAT Data Centre Archive and the NASA Physical Oceanography Distributed Active Archive Center (PO.DAAC) archive.