| CEOS EO HANDBOOK – MEASUREMENT INSTRUMENTS
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Measurements > Snow and Ice >
Ice sheet topography >
Sea-ice sheet topography
  | Measurement Definition*: Vertical projection of an area covered by ice sheets in meters. |
| Instrument | Status/
Accuracy | Instrument Description | Measurement Technology | Timeline |
ASTER
Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer | Operational
| Surface and cloud imaging with high spatial resolution, stereoscopic observation of local topography, cloud heights, volcanic plumes, and generation of local surface digital elevation maps. Surface temperature and emissivity. ASTER SWIR detectors are no longer functioning due to anomalously high SWIR detector temperatures. ASTER SWIR data acquired since April 2008 are not useable, and show saturation of values and severe striping. All attempts to bring the SWIR bands back to life have failed, and no further action is envisioned. | n/a |  |
HiRI
High-Resolution Imager | Operational
| Cartography, land use, risk, agriculture and forestry, civil planning and mapping, digital terrain models, defence. | n/a | |
PALSAR-2
Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar-2 | Operational
| Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry. | n/a | |
SAR (RADARSAT-2)
Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) C band | Operational
| All-weather images of ocean, ice and land surfaces. Used for monitoring of coastal zones, polar ice, sea ice, sea state, geological features, vegetation and land surface processes. | n/a | |
SAR (RCM)
Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) C band | Operational
| All-weather, C-band data to support ecosystem monitoring, maritime surveillance and disaster management. | n/a | |
SAR-L
L-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar | Operational
| Land, ocean, emergencies, soil moisture, interferometry, others. | n/a | |
SIRAL
SAR Interferometer Radar Altimeter | Operational
| Marine ice and terrestrial ice sheet thickness measurement. | n/a | |
SRAL
SAR Radar Altimeter | Operational
| Marine and land services. | n/a | |
WSAR
WSAR | Operational
| High resolution radar measurements of land and ocean features. | n/a | |
IRIS
Interferometric Radar Altimeter for Ice and Snow | Being developed
| Ku-band Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar Altimeter (with added Ka-band channel for snow depth retrieval and in combination with AMR-CR MW Radiometer for ice&snow classification and wet troposphere correction) to cover the needs for continuous monitoring of the sea ice
thickness and land ice elevation measurement after Cryosat-2 with enhanced performance. | n/a | |
PALSAR-3
Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar-3 | Being developed
| Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry. | n/a | |
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* Description adapted from WMO.
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