GRACE-FO: science mission status and plans towards the extended mission phase
- 1Helmholtz Centre Potsdam GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Geodesy, Potsdam, Germany
- 2Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, USA
- 3Center for Space Research, University of Texas, Austin, USA
The GRACE Follow-On mission, a partnership between NASA (US) and GFZ (Germany), will end its nominal mission lifetime in May 2023 of five years and continues the essential climate data record of mass change in the Earth system initiated in 2002 by the GRACE mission. The combined GRACE & GRACE-FO data records now span over 21 years and provide unique observations of monthly to decadal global mass changes and transport in the Earth system derived from temporal variations in the Earth’s gravity field. These observations have become indispensable for climate-related studies that enable process understanding of the evolving global water cycle, including ocean dynamics, polar ice mass changes, and near-surface and global ground water changes.
In this presentation, we will discuss (1) some recent GRACE/GRACE-FO science and applications highlights, (2) key data processing and calibration approaches on GRACE-FO, with a particular focus on the accelerometer data, and also (3) the GRACE-FO mission plan to operate and collect high-quality science data through the intensifying solar cycle 25, aiming for continuity with future mass change missions.
How to cite: Flechtner, F., Landerer, F., Save, H., Mccullough, C., Dahle, C., Bettadpur, S., Gaston, R., and Snopek, K.: GRACE-FO: science mission status and plans towards the extended mission phase, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-7604, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-7604, 2023.
