Observations of ocean surface winds are vital for marine navigation, predicting hurricanes and other oceanic storms, science and modeling of the ocean-atmosphere interface, and are of increasing importance for offshore wind energy applications. Satellite-based scatterometers, synthetic aperture radars (SARs), altimeters, and passive microwave radiometers all provide wind retrievals.
This activity is currently in pre-formulation and aims to combine wind retrievals from Advanced Scatterometer (ASCAT)-B/C, Sentinel-1, Radar Satellite (RADARSAT) 2, NASA/Indian Space Research Organisation Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR), Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS)-4, Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT), commercial SARs, Compact Ocean Wind Vector Radiometer (COWVR), Soil Moisture Active Pass (SMAP), Global Precipitation Measurement Microwave Imager (GMI), and Special Sensor Microwave Imagers/Sounders (SSMIs) to generate gridded wind speed data every ~6 hours. Wind direction will be provided when available from scatterometers and polarimetric radiometers. This combined product will greatly increase the spatial coverage and temporal resolution of ocean surface wind coverage as compared to the existing, instrument-specific, orbital data, and will provide analysis-ready data from a single source, with a common format and grid.
| Thematic Areas |
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| Disaster Response, Ocean and Cryosphere, Weather and Atmospheric Dynamics |
This activity will provide observations of near-surface winds over the data-sparse global oceans at roughly six-hour intervals, providing key inputs to atmospheric and oceanic general circulation models. Gridded wind data will contribute to the forecasting of hurricanes and other marine hazards. They will also provide important information for off-shore wind energy generation.