Amanda Plagge (NOAA/GST, United States)

The CEOS Virtual Altimetry Constellation now includes multiple altimeter missions that are capable of monitoring sea level change at climate scales. Because Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich is designated as the sea level reference mission of the CEOS Virtual Altimetry Constellation, it requires particularly careful evaluation of its stability to ensure the integrity of the sea level climate data record from altimetry. We present an update of how well the 1-mm/year stability goal has been met with the official data products for Jason-3 and Sentinel-6 MF. While the Sentinel-3 missions don’t have a stability goal for sea level, they are near-independent measurements of global mean sea level, and therefore estimating their stability is also valuable to monitoring sea level rise and acceleration.

In this presentation, we provide updates of the NOAA Laboratory for Satellite Altimetry’s Tide Gauge Comparison System for Jason-3, Sentinel-3, and Sentinel-6. We will compare results from different mission processing and retracking methods (i.e. High-Resolution, Low-Resolution, Pseudo-Low Resolution Mode, adaptive retracker). In addition to results from the baseline processors, we’ll also present results from additional parameters, including reprocessed orbits from NASA/GSFC.