Validation of ozone measurements from the Atmospheric Chemistry Experiment (ACE)

E. Dupuy (1) , K. A. Walker (1, 2) , J. Kar (2) , C. D. Boone (1) , C. T. Mcelroy (2, 3) , P. F. Bernath (1, 4) , J. R. Drummond (2, 5) , R. Skelton (1) , S. D. Mcleod (1) , R. C. Hughes (1) , C. R. Nowlan (2) , D. G. Dufour (6) , J. Zou (2) , F. Nichitiu (2) , K. Strong (2) , P. Baron (7) , R. M. Bevilacqua (8) , T. Blumenstock (9) , G. E. Bodeker (10) , T. Borsdorff (11) , A. E. Bourassa (12) , H. Bovensmann (13) , I. S. Boyd , A. Bracher (13) , C. Brogniez (14) , J. P. Burrows (13) , Valéry Catoire (15) , S. Ceccherini (16) , S. Chabrillat (17) , T. Christensen (18) , M. T. Coffey (19) , U. Cortesi (16) , J. Davies (3) , C. de Clercq (17) , D. A. Degenstein (12) , M. de Mazière (17) , P. Demoulin (20) , J. Dodion (17) , B. Firanski (3) , H. Fischer (9) , G. Forbes (21) , L. Froidevaux (22) , D. Fussen (17) , P. Gerard (17) , Sophie Godin-Beekmann (23) , Florence Goutail (23) , J. Granville (17) , D. Griffith (24) , C. S. Haley (25) , J. W. Hannigan (19) , M. Höpfner (9) , J. J. Jin (26) , A. Jones (27) , N. B. Jones (24) , K. Jucks (28) , A. Kagawa (7, 29) , Y. Kasai (7) , T. E. Kerzenmacher (2) , A. Kleinböhl (22, 13) , A. R. Klekociuk (30) , I. Kramer (9) , H. Küllmann (13) , J. Kuttippurath (23, 13) , E. Kyrölä (31) , J.-C. Lambert (17) , N. J. Livesey (22) , E. J. Llewellyn (12) , N. D. Lloyd (12) , E. Mahieu (20) , G. L. Manney (22, 32) , B. T. Marshall (33) , J. C. Mcconnell (26) , M. P. Mccormick (34) , I. S. Mcdermid (22) , M. Mchugh (33) , C. A. Mclinden (3) , J. Mellqvist (27) , K. Mizutani (7) , Y. Murayama (7) , D. P. Murtagh (27) , H. Oelhaf (9) , A. Parrish (35) , S. V. Petelina (12, 36) , C. Piccolo (37) , Jean-Pierre Pommereau (23) , C. E. Randall (38) , Cédric Robert Robert (15) , C. Roth (12) , M. Schneider (9) , C. Senten (17) , T. Steck (9) , A. Strandberg (27) , K. B. Strawbridge (3) , R. Sussmann (11) , D. P. J. Swart (39) , D. W. Tarasick (3) , J. R. Taylor (2) , C. Tétard (14) , L. W. Thomason (34) , A. M. Thompson (40) , M. B. Tully (41) , Jakub Urban (27) , F. Vanhellemont (17) , T. von Clarmann (9) , P. von Der Gathen (42) , C. von Savigny (13) , J. W. Waters (22) , J. C. Witte (43, 44) , M. Wolff (2) , J. M. Zawodny (34)

1 Department of Chemistry [Waterloo]
2 Department of Physics [Toronto]
3 ECCC - Environment and Climate Change Canada
4 Department of Chemistry [York, UK]
5 Department of Physics and Atmospheric Science [Halifax]
6 Picomole Instruments Inc.
7 NICT - National Institute of Information and Communications Technology [Tokyo]
8 NRL - Naval Research Laboratory
9 IMK - Institute for Meteorology and Climate Research
10 NIWA - National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research [Wellington]
11 IMK-IFU - Institut für Meteorologie und Klimaforschung - Atmosphärische Umweltforschung
12 ISAS - Institute of Space and Atmospheric Studies [Saskatoon]
13 IUP - Institut für Umweltphysik [Bremen]
14 LOA - Laboratoire d’Optique Atmosphérique - UMR 8518
15 LPCE - Laboratoire de physique et chimie de l'environnement
16 IFAC - Istituto di Fisica Applicata "Nello Carrara"
17 BIRA-IASB - Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy / Institut d'Aéronomie Spatiale de Belgique
18 Danish Climate Centre
19 ESSL - Earth and Sun Systems Laboratory
20 Institut d'Astrophysique et de Géophysique [Liège]
21 Environment Canada Sable Island
22 JPL - Jet Propulsion Laboratory
23 SA - Service d'aéronomie
24 School of Chemistry [Wollongong]
25 CRESS - Centre for Research in Earth and Space Science [Toronto]
26 ESSE - Department of Earth and Space Science and Engineering [York University - Toronto]
27 Department of Radio and Space Science [Göteborg]
28 CfA - Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
29 Fujitsu FIP Corporation
30 IOAC - Ice, Ocean, Atmosphere and Climate Program [Kingston]
31 FMI - Finnish Meteorological Institute
32 NMT - New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology [New Mexico Tech]
33 GATS Inc.
34 Atmospheric Sciences Division [Hampton]
35 Department of Astronomy [Amherst]
36 Department of Physics [Victoria]
37 AOPP - Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Planetary Physics [Oxford]
38 LASP - Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics [Boulder]
39 RIVM - National Institute for Public Health and the Environment [Bilthoven]
40 PennState Meteorology Department
41 BoM - Australian Bureau of Meteorology [Melbourne]
42 Alfred Wegener Institute [Potsdam]
43 SSAI - Science Systems and Applications, Inc. [Lanham]
44 GSFC - NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

This paper presents extensive validation analyses of ozone observations from the Atmospheric Chemistry Experiment (ACE) satellite instruments: the ACE Fourier Transform Spectrometer (ACE-FTS) and the Measurement of Aerosol Extinction in the Stratosphere and Troposphere Retrieved by Occultation (ACE-MAESTRO) instrument. The ACE satellite instruments operate in the mid-infrared and ultraviolet-visible-near-infrared spectral regions using the solar occultation technique. In order to continue the long-standing record of solar occultation measurements from space, a detailed quality assessment is required to evaluate the ACE data and validate their use for scientific purposes. Here we compare the latest ozone data products from ACE-FTS and ACE-MAESTRO with coincident observations from satellite-borne, airborne, balloon-borne and ground-based instruments, by analysing volume mixing ratio profiles and partial column densities. The ACE-FTS version 2.2 Ozone Update product reports more ozone than most correlative measurements from the upper troposphere to the lower mesosphere. At altitude levels from 16 to 44 km, the mean differences range generally between 0 and +10% with a slight but systematic positive bias (typically +5%). At higher altitudes (45–60 km), the ACE-FTS ozone amounts are significantly larger than those of the comparison instruments by up to ~40% (typically +20%). For the ACE-MAESTRO version 1.2 ozone data product, agreement within ±10% (generally better than ±5%) is found between 18 and 40 km for the sunrise and sunset measurements. At higher altitudes (45–55 km), systematic biases of opposite sign are found between the ACE-MAESTRO sunrise and sunset observations. While ozone amounts derived from the ACE-MAESTRO sunrise occultation data are often smaller than the coincident observations (by as much as -10%), the sunset occultation profiles for ACE-MAESTRO show results that are qualitatively similar to ACE-FTS and indicate a large positive bias (+10 to +30%) in this altitude range. In contrast, there is no significant difference in bias found for the ACE-FTS sunrise and sunset measurements. These systematic effects in the ozone profiles retrieved from the measurements of ACE-FTS and ACE-MAESTRO are being investigated. This work shows that the ACE instruments provide reliable, high quality measurements from the tropopause to the upper stratosphere and can be used with confidence in this vertical domain.

Domaines: Océan, Atmosphère; Physique Atmosphérique et Océanique [physics.ao-ph]

E. Dupuy, K. A. Walker, J. Kar, C. D. Boone, C. T. Mcelroy, et al.. Validation of ozone measurements from the Atmospheric Chemistry Experiment (ACE). Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions, 2008, 8 (1), pp.2513-2656. ⟨hal-00328302⟩