On the TEC bias of altimeter satellites

TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason-1, Jason-2 and Jason-3 altimeter missions have provided 27 + years of uninterrupted Total Electron Content (TEC) measurements since 1992, with unprecedented precision. Nevertheless, the issue of a possible systematic bias in the data was identified immediately after first TOPEX measurements were compared with measurements from other sources. The bias issue has remained open for decades, and it has increased in complexity because each new mission had its different bias. The purpose of this paper is to assess the problem of TEC bias of altimeters. Two approaches have been followed. The first one relied on the TEC data series of the four altimeters to determine inter-mission systematic biases using the last available data versions for each mission. The second approach consisted of inspecting the missions’ official reports to trace changes of the inter-mission and inter-version biases, including biases relative to DORIS ionospheric measurements. Both approaches have converged and resulted in the determination of a reference frame where missions, instruments and ionospheric reference levels could be compared. This reference frame was also used to analyze results published in representative papers during the last decades, including ionospheric data from the ENVISAT mission. This reference frame could help to assess TEC levels of the announced new data version of Jason-2, Jason-3 and the imminent Jason-CS/Sentinel missions. The main conclusion of this work is that Jason-1, ‘E’ data version, defines a TEC reference level which is compatible with most of the results found in the literature. Highlights