A pilot study of scientific data stewardship with global water vapor

Scientific data stewardship of Climate Data Records (CDR's) is a topic of increasing interest within NOAA and the climate community. Satellite observations of Earth taken since the 1960's provide an invaluable record of Earth's climate which will be explored by future scientists for many years to come. Archive recovery, documentation and data management are a vital task to ensure that these records are of sufficient quality for future users.

Scientific data stewardship of satellite data encompasses efforts beyond just preserving the archive. Orbital drifts, instrument changes over time, discontinuities between different sensors, and algorithm changes all can introduce spurious effects into satellite CDR's. Stewardship of CDR's seeks to understand and mitigate these effects to increase their value.

CIRA has begun a pilot study to explore scientific data stewardship of the water vapor record contained in the NASA Water Vapor Project (NVAP) dataset. Sensors onboard the NASA Aqua spacecraft, such as AIRS and AMSR, will be compared to the heritage approach used to create NVAP for the years 1988 – 2001. Both layered and total precipitable water will be compared. Since Aqua was not launched until 2002, several selected months of NVAP were created in 2003 and 2004 to make the connection to Aqua.

Results of the comparison between Aqua and NVAP will be shown, as well as comparisons to GPS total precipitable water amounts. Findings relevant to scientific data stewardship of the water vapor CDR will be discussed.