Simplified Extended Kalman Filter Research Articles

Assimilating ASCAT normalized backscatter and slope into the land surface model ISBA-A-gs using a Deep Neural Network as the observation operator: Case studies at ISMN stations in western Europe

ASCAT normalized backscatter (σ40o) and slope (σ′) contain valuable information about soil moisture and vegetation. While σ40o has been assimilated to constrain soil moisture, sometimes together with Leaf Area Index (LAI), this study is the first to assimilate σ′ directly to constrain vegetation states. Here, we assimilate σ40o and slope σ′ into the ISBA-A-gs LSM using the Simplified Extended Kalman Filter (SEKF) using a Deep Neural Network (DNN) as the observation operator. The performances of the data assimilation (DA) and open loop (OL) are evaluated against in-situ soil moisture observations from the International Soil Moisture Network (ISMN), and LAI observations from the Copernicus Global Land Service (CGLS). Given an accurate and physically plausible observation operator, along with well-defined model and observation errors, the data assimilation system should yield improved estimates of the model states. However, results show that the DA performance is neutral compared to the OL in terms of the median unbiased root mean square error (ubRMSE) and Pearson correlation coefficient (ρ) across all validation sites. In addition, an analysis of the residuals and innovations confirms that DA had limited or no impact. This poor performance is perplexing. Furthermore, given the growing interest in the use of machine-learning-based observation operators, it is essential to understand the role that the use of the DNN may be playing in this poor performance. While representativeness errors and error specification play some part, it is demonstrated that the key factor constraining the efficacy of the SEKF is the correct estimation of the Jacobians that control the degree to which the observations update the states in the SEKF. It is argued that the DNN relating model states to satellite observations must have physically-plausible and robust Jacobians for the DNN to be effective in a data assimilation framework.

УСВОЕНИЕ ДАННЫХ ПРИЗЕМНЫХ НАБЛЮДЕНИЙ ДЛЯ АНАЛИЗА ВЛАЖНОСТИ ПОЧВЫ МНОГОСЛОЙНОЙ МОДЕЛИ ДЕЯТЕЛЬНОГО СЛОЯ СУШИ ИВМ РАН - МГУ В СОСТАВЕ ГЛОБАЛЬНОЙ СИСТЕМЫ МОДЕЛИРОВАНИЯ АТМОСФЕРЫ ПЛАВ

The implementation of the soil moisture analysis algorithm based on screen-level observations of air temperature and relative humidity for the INM RAS-MSU multilayer active soil layer model is presented. This soil model is a part of the global atmospheric model SL-AV. Methodical experiments on tuning of the simplified extended Kalman filter algorithm for considered atmospheric modeling system are carried out. It is found that the use of soil moisture analysis as initial data allows increasing the accuracy of short- and medium-range forecasts for screen-level temperature and relative humidity during summer season at the part of Asia, the European part of Russia, and the southeastern part of North America. The recommendations obtained in this work can be used for tuning the simplified extended Kalman filter algorithm to prepare initial data for long-range weather forecasts.

Assimilation of the SCATSAR-SWI with SURFEX: Impact of Local Observation Errors in Austria

AbstractThe proper determination of soil moisture on different scales is important for applications in a variety of fields. We aim to develop a high-level soil moisture product with high temporal and spatial resolution by assimilating the multilayer soil moisture product SCATSAR-SWI (Scatterometer Synthetic Aperture Radar Soil Water Index) into the surface model SURFEX. In addition, we probe the impact of the findings on the numerical weather prediction (NWP) in Austria. The data assimilation system consists of the NWP model AROME and the SURFEX Offline Data Assimilation, which provide atmospheric forcing and soil moisture fields as mutual input. To address the known sensitivity of the employed simplified extended Kalman filter to the specification of errors, we compute the observation error variances of the SCATSAR-SWI locally using Triple Collocation Analysis and implement them into the assimilation system. The verification of the forecasted 2 m temperature and relative humidity against measurements of Austrian weather stations shows that the actual impact of the local error approach on the atmospheric forecast is slightly positive to neutral compared to the standard error approach, depending on the time of the year. The direct verification of the soil moisture analysis against a gridded water balance product reveals a degradation of the unbiased root-mean-square error for small observation errors.

Recent developments in the data assimilation of AROME/HU numerical weather prediction model

A local three-dimensional variational data assimilation (DA) system was implemented operationally in AROME/HU (Application of Research to Operations at Mesoscale) non-hydrostatic mesoscale model at the Hungarian Meteorological Service (OMSZ) in 2013. In the first version, rapid update cycling (RUC) approach was employed with 3-hour frequency in local upper-air DA using conventional observations only. Optimal interpolation method was adopted for the surface data assimilation later in 2016. This paper describes the current developments showing the impact of more conventional and remote-sensing observations assimilated in this system, which reveals the benefit of additional local high-resolution observations. Furthermore, it is shown that an hourly assimilation-forecast cycle outperforms the 3-hourly updated system in our DA. Besides the upper-air assimilation developments, a simplified extended Kalman filter (SEKF) was also tested for surface data assimilation, showing promising performance on both the analyses and the forecasts of AROME/HU system.

A Simplified Extended Kalman Filter Used for Magnetic and Inertial Measurement Units

As a sensor unit, a magnetic and inertial measurement unit (MIMU) is mainly composed of a tri-axis gyroscope, a tri-axis accelerometer and a tri-axis magnetometer. The Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) is the currently preferred algorithm used to fuse the outputs of the MIMU sensor in order to determine the attitude of the MIMU's carrier platform. One of the main problems of the EKF is its high computational cost, which is largely due to solving the matrix inversion in the Kalman gain. This article simplifies the Kalman gain by ensuring it does not contain any matrices that would require an inversion operation. This is achieved by simplifying the linearized measurement matrix (the Jacobian matrix) through orthogonalizing the observation and reference vectors. The inversion of the matrix contained in the Kalman gain can then be mathematically derived and the derived matrix can eventually replace the matrix inversion, in order to avoid the inversion operation when the EKF is executed. The simplified EKF is compared to the traditional EKF experimentally and the results show that the simplified method has similar accuracy to the traditional method, but with a faster execution time.

An ensemble square root filter for the joint assimilation of surface soil moisture and leaf area index within the Land Data Assimilation System LDAS-Monde: application over the Euro-Mediterranean region

Abstract. This paper introduces an ensemble square root filter (EnSRF) in the context of jointly assimilating observations of surface soil moisture (SSM) and the leaf area index (LAI) in the Land Data Assimilation System LDAS-Monde. By ingesting those satellite-derived products, LDAS-Monde constrains the Interaction between Soil, Biosphere and Atmosphere (ISBA) land surface model (LSM), coupled with the CNRM (Centre National de Recherches Météorologiques) version of the Total Runoff Integrating Pathways (CTRIP) model to improve the reanalysis of land surface variables (LSVs). To evaluate its ability to produce improved LSVs reanalyses, the EnSRF is compared with the simplified extended Kalman filter (SEKF), which has been well studied within the LDAS-Monde framework. The comparison is carried out over the Euro-Mediterranean region at a 0.25∘ spatial resolution between 2008 and 2017. Both data assimilation approaches provide a positive impact on SSM and LAI estimates with respect to the model alone, putting them closer to assimilated observations. The SEKF and the EnSRF have a similar behaviour for LAI showing performance levels that are influenced by the vegetation type. For SSM, EnSRF estimates tend to be closer to observations than SEKF values. The comparison between the two data assimilation approaches is also carried out on unobserved soil moisture in the other layers of soil. Unobserved control variables are updated in the EnSRF through covariances and correlations sampled from the ensemble linking them to observed control variables. In our context, a strong correlation between SSM and soil moisture in deeper soil layers is found, as expected, showing seasonal patterns that vary geographically. Moderate correlation and anti-correlations are also noticed between LAI and soil moisture, varying in space and time. Their absolute value, reaching their maximum in summer and their minimum in winter, tends to be larger for soil moisture in root-zone areas, showing that assimilating LAI can have an influence on soil moisture. Finally an independent evaluation of both assimilation approaches is conducted using satellite estimates of evapotranspiration (ET) and gross primary production (GPP) as well as measures of river discharges from gauging stations. The EnSRF shows a systematic albeit moderate improvement of root mean square differences (RMSDs) and correlations for ET and GPP products, but its main improvement is observed on river discharges with a high positive impact on Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency scores. Compared to the EnSRF, the SEKF displays a more contrasting performance.

Towards a Long-Term Reanalysis of Land Surface Variables over Western Africa: LDAS-Monde Applied over Burkina Faso from 2001 to 2018

This study focuses on the ability of the global Land Data Assimilation System, LDAS-Monde, to improve the representation of land surface variables (LSVs) over Burkina-Faso through the joint assimilation of satellite derived surface soil moisture (SSM) and leaf area index (LAI) from January 2001 to June 2018. The LDAS-Monde offline system is forced by the latest European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) atmospheric reanalysis ERA5 as well as ERA-Interim former reanalysis, leading to reanalyses of LSVs at 0.25° × 0.25° and 0.50° × 0.50° spatial resolution, respectively. Within LDAS-Monde, SSM and LAI observations from the Copernicus Global Land Service (CGLS) are assimilated with a simplified extended Kalman filter (SEKF) using the CO2-responsive version of the ISBA (Interactions between Soil, Biosphere, and Atmosphere) land surface model (LSM). First, it is shown that ERA5 better represents precipitation and incoming solar radiation than ERA-Interim former reanalysis from ECMWF based on in situ data. Results of four experiments are then compared: Open-loop simulation (i.e., no assimilation) and analysis (i.e., joint assimilation of SSM and LAI) forced by either ERA5 or ERA-Interim. After jointly assimilating SSM and LAI, it is noticed that the assimilation is able to impact soil moisture in the first top soil layers (the first 20 cm), and also in deeper soil layers (from 20 cm to 60 cm and below), as reflected by the structure of the SEKF Jacobians. The added value of using ERA5 reanalysis over ERA-Interim when used in LDAS-Monde is highlighted. The assimilation is able to improve the simulation of both SSM and LAI: The analyses add skill to both configurations, indicating the healthy behavior of LDAS-Monde. For LAI in particular, the southern region of the domain (dominated by a Sudan-Guinean climate) highlights a strong impact of the assimilation compared to the other two sub-regions of Burkina-Faso (dominated by Sahelian and Sudan-Sahelian climates). In the southern part of the domain, differences between the model and the observations are the largest, prior to any assimilation. These differences are linked to the model failing to represent the behavior of some specific vegetation species, which are known to put on leaves before the first rains of the season. The LDAS-Monde analysis is very efficient at compensating for this model weakness. Evapotranspiration estimates from the Global Land Evaporation Amsterdam Model (GLEAM) project as well as upscaled carbon uptake from the FLUXCOM project and sun-induced fluorescence from the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment-2 (GOME-2) are used in the evaluation process, again demonstrating improvements in the representation of evapotranspiration and gross primary production after assimilation.

Sequential assimilation of satellite-derived vegetation and soil moisture products using SURFEX_v8.0: LDAS-Monde assessment over the Euro-Mediterranean area

Abstract. In this study, a global land data assimilation system (LDAS-Monde) is applied over Europe and the Mediterranean basin to increase monitoring accuracy for land surface variables. LDAS-Monde is able to ingest information from satellite-derived surface soil moisture (SSM) and leaf area index (LAI) observations to constrain the interactions between soil–biosphere–atmosphere (ISBA, Interactions between Soil, Biosphere and Atmosphere) land surface model (LSM) coupled with the CNRM (Centre National de Recherches Météorologiques) version of the Total Runoff Integrating Pathways (ISBA-CTRIP) continental hydrological system. It makes use of the CO2-responsive version of ISBA which models leaf-scale physiological processes and plant growth. Transfer of water and heat in the soil rely on a multilayer diffusion scheme. SSM and LAI observations are assimilated using a simplified extended Kalman filter (SEKF), which uses finite differences from perturbed simulations to generate flow dependence between the observations and the model control variables. The latter include LAI and seven layers of soil (from 1 to 100 cm depth). A sensitivity test of the Jacobians over 2000–2012 exhibits effects related to both depth and season. It also suggests that observations of both LAI and SSM have an impact on the different control variables. From the assimilation of SSM, the LDAS is more effective in modifying soil moisture (SM) from the top layers of soil, as model sensitivity to SSM decreases with depth and has almost no impact from 60 cm downwards. From the assimilation of LAI, a strong impact on LAI itself is found. The LAI assimilation impact is more pronounced in SM layers that contain the highest fraction of roots (from 10 to 60 cm). The assimilation is more efficient in summer and autumn than in winter and spring. Results shows that the LDAS works well constraining the model to the observations and that stronger corrections are applied to LAI than to SM. A comprehensive evaluation of the assimilation impact is conducted using (i) agricultural statistics over France, (ii) river discharge observations, (iii) satellite-derived estimates of land evapotranspiration from the Global Land Evaporation Amsterdam Model (GLEAM) project and (iv) spatially gridded observation-based estimates of upscaled gross primary production and evapotranspiration from the FLUXNET network. Comparisons with those four datasets highlight neutral to highly positive improvement.

Simpplified extended Kalman filter phase noise estimation for CO-OFDM transmissions.

We propose a flexible simplified extended Kalman filter (S-EKF) scheme that can be applied in both pilot-aided and blind modes for phase noise compensation in 16-QAM CO-OFDM transmission systems employing a small-to-moderate number of subcarriers. The performance of the proposed algorithm is evaluated and compared with conventional pilot-aided (PA) and blind phase search (BPS) methods via extensive an Monte Carlo simulation in a back-to-back configuration and with a dual polarization fiber transmission. For 64 subcarrier 32 Gbaud 16-QAM CO-OFDM systems with 200 kHz combined laser linewidths, an optical signal-to-noise ratio penalty as low as 1 dB can be achieved with the proposed S-EKF scheme using only 2 pilots in the pilot-aided mode and just 4 inputs in the blind mode, resulting in a spectrally efficient enhancement by a factor of 3 and a computational effort reduction by a factor of more than 50 in comparison with the conventional PA and the BPS methods, respectively.

A Simplified Extended Kalman Filter assimilation of soil moisture for the SL-AV global medium-range forecast model

The implementation of the Simplified Extended Kalman Filter (SEKF) for the deep soil moisture initialization in the SL-AV global atmosphere model is described. Special attention is paid to the calculation of the observation operator and analysis increment. SL-AV screen-level parameters forecasts are estimated with SEKF and optimal interpolation initialization methods. It is demonstrated that the implementation of the assimilation algorithm improves the model forecast quality for screen-level temperature and relative humidity.

The effect of satellite-derived surface soil moisture and leaf area index land data assimilation on streamflow simulations over France

Abstract. This study evaluates the impact of assimilating surface soil moisture (SSM) and leaf area index (LAI) observations into a land surface model using the SAFRAN–ISBA–MODCOU (SIM) hydrological suite. SIM consists of three stages: (1) an atmospheric reanalysis (SAFRAN) over France, which forces (2) the three-layer ISBA land surface model, which then provides drainage and runoff inputs to (3) the MODCOU hydro-geological model. The drainage and runoff outputs from ISBA are validated by comparing the simulated river discharge from MODCOU with over 500 river-gauge observations over France and with a subset of stations with low-anthropogenic influence, over several years. This study makes use of the A-gs version of ISBA that allows for physiological processes. The atmospheric forcing for the ISBA-A-gs model underestimates direct shortwave and long-wave radiation by approximately 5 % averaged over France. The ISBA-A-gs model also substantially underestimates the grassland LAI compared with satellite retrievals during winter dormancy. These differences result in an underestimation (overestimation) of evapotranspiration (drainage and runoff). The excess runoff flowing into the rivers and aquifers contributes to an overestimation of the SIM river discharge. Two experiments attempted to resolve these problems: (i) a correction of the minimum LAI model parameter for grasslands and (ii) a bias-correction of the model radiative forcing. Two data assimilation experiments were also performed, which are designed to correct random errors in the initial conditions: (iii) the assimilation of LAI observations and (iv) the assimilation of SSM and LAI observations. The data assimilation for (iii) and (iv) was done with a simplified extended Kalman filter (SEKF), which uses finite differences in the observation operator Jacobians to relate the observations to the model variables. Experiments (i) and (ii) improved the median SIM Nash scores by about 9 % and 18 % respectively. Experiment (iii) reduced the LAI phase errors in ISBA-A-gs but had little impact on the discharge Nash efficiency of SIM. In contrast, experiment (iv) resulted in spurious increases in drainage and runoff, which degraded the median discharge Nash efficiency by about 7 %. The poor performance of the SEKF originates from the observation operator Jacobians. These Jacobians are dampened when the soil is saturated and when the vegetation is dormant, which leads to positive biases in drainage and/or runoff and to insufficient corrections during winter, respectively. Possible ways to improve the model are discussed, including a new multi-layer diffusion model and a more realistic response of photosynthesis to temperature in mountainous regions. The data assimilation should be advanced by accounting for model and forcing uncertainties.

Influence of back-EMF and current harmonics on sensorless control performance of single and dual three-phase permanent magnet synchronous machines

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of back-EMF and current harmonics on position and speed estimation accuracy for single and dual three-phase (DTP) permanent magnet synchronous machines (PMSMs) with two fundamental-model-based sensorless control strategies which are widely utilized for AC machines, i.e. flux-linkage observer (FO) and simplified extended Kalman filter (EKF). Design/methodology/approach – The effect of distorted back-EMF is studied for sensorless vector control of single three-phase PMSM. For the influence of current harmonics, unlike the existing literature where the current harmonics are deliberately injected, in this paper, sensorless switching-table-based direct torque control (ST-DTC) strategies for DTP-PMSM which inherently suffer from non-sinusoidal stator currents in addition to the distorted back-EMF, are investigated experimentally. Findings – By employing the FO and simplified EKF-based sensorless vector control of single three-phase PMSM, it can be concluded that the rotor position estimation accuracy is less affected by the back-EMF harmonics when the simplified EKF method is utilized since it is less sensitive to such noises. When the influence of non-sinusoidal stator currents together with back-EMF harmonics is investigated for the conventional and modified ST-DTC of DTP-PMSM, it is indicated that the simplified EKF exhibits better position and speed estimation accuracy in both the conventional and modified ST-DTC strategies. In addition, its steady-state performance shows a slight superiority over that based on FO, in terms of flux and torque ripples, and THD of phase currents. For the dynamic performance, the estimated speed of simplified EKF shows less phase lag and fluctuations compared to that of FO. Originality/value – This paper introduces the influence of back-EMF and current harmonics on sensorless control performance for single and DTP PMSMs. Detailed experimental results show that the simplified EKF exhibits better rotor position and speed estimation accuracy compared to that of FO due to its higher noise-rejection ability.

Comparing the ensemble and extended Kalman filters for in situ soil moisture assimilation with contrasting conditions

Abstract. Two data assimilation (DA) methods are compared for their ability to produce an accurate soil moisture analysis using the Météo-France land surface model: (i) SEKF, a simplified extended Kalman filter, which uses a climatological background-error covariance, and (ii) EnSRF, the ensemble square root filter, which uses an ensemble background-error covariance and approximates random rainfall errors stochastically. In situ soil moisture observations at 5 cm depth are assimilated into the surface layer and 30 cm deep observations are used to evaluate the root-zone analysis on 12 sites in south-western France (SMOSMANIA network). These sites differ in terms of climate and soil texture. The two methods perform similarly and improve on the open loop. Both methods suffer from incorrect linear assumptions which are particularly degrading to the analysis during water-stressed conditions: the EnSRF by a dry bias and the SEKF by an over-sensitivity of the model Jacobian between the surface and the root-zone layers. These problems are less severe for the sites with wetter climates. A simple bias correction technique is tested on the EnSRF. Although this reduces the bias, it modifies the soil moisture fluxes and suppresses the ensemble spread, which degrades the analysis performance. However, the EnSRF flow-dependent background-error covariance evidently captures seasonal variability in the soil moisture errors and should exploit planned improvements in the model physics. Synthetic twin experiments demonstrate that when there is only a random component in the precipitation forcing errors, the correct stochastic representation of these errors enables the EnSRF to perform better than the SEKF. It might therefore be possible for the EnSRF to perform better than the SEKF with real data, if the rainfall uncertainty was accurately captured. However, the simple rainfall error model is not advantageous in our real experiments. More realistic rainfall error models are suggested.

Sensorless Direct Torque Control of Induction Machine Using Luenberger Observer and Simplified Extended Kalman Filter

A comparison between the sensorless Direct Torque Control (DTC) of the induction machine, based on different observers is proposed in this paper. The two DTC systems adopt alternatively a simplified extended Kalman filter and the Luenberger observer in order to estimate the speed of the induction machine and other quantities. PI regulator is used to regulate the estimate speed and improve the performances of the whole system. Simulation results show that the ripples of both torque and flux are reduced remarkable and a good dynamic of the speed and torque are achieved.

Impact of ASCAT Soil Moisture Assimilation on Regional Precipitation Forecasts: A Case Study for Austria

Abstract In this study, remotely sensed soil moisture data from the Advanced Scatterometer (ASCAT) on board the Meteorological Operational (MetOp) series of satellites are assimilated in the regional forecasting model, Aire Limitée Adaptation Dynamique Développement International (ALADIN-Austria), using a simplified extended Kalman filter. A pointwise bias correction method is applied to the ASCAT data as well as quality flags prepared by the data provider. The ASCAT assimilation case study is performed over central Europe during a 1-month period in July 2009. Forecasts of those assimilation experiments are compared to the control run provided by the operational ALADIN version of the Austrian Met Service, Zentralanstalt für Meteorologie und Geodynamik (ZAMG). Forecasts are furthermore verified versus in situ data. For a single-day case study the ability of the approach to improve precipitation forecast quality in the presence of high impact weather is demonstrated. Results show that 1) based on a one station in situ data evaluation, soil moisture analysis is improved, compared to the operational analysis, when ASCAT soil moisture data is assimilated; 2) pointwise bias correction of the satellite data is beneficial for forecast quality; 3) screen level parameter forecasts can be slightly improved as a result of this approach; and 4) convective precipitation forecast is improved over flatland for the investigation period while over mountainous regions the impact is neutral.

Assimilation of surface soil moisture into a multilayer soil model: design and evaluation at local scale

Abstract. Land surface models (LSM) have improved considerably in the last two decades. In this study, the Interactions between Surface, Biosphere, and Atmosphere (ISBA) LSM soil diffusion scheme is used (with 11 soil layers represented). A simplified extended Kalman filter (SEKF) allows ground observations of surface soil moisture (SSM) to be assimilated in the multilayer LSM in order to constrain deep soil moisture. In parallel, the same simulations are performed using the ISBA LSM with 2 soil layers (a thin surface layer and a bulk reservoir). Simulations are performed over a 3 yr period (2003–2005) for a bare soil field in southwestern France, at the SMOSREX (Surface Monitoring Of the Soil Reservoir Experiment) site. Analyzed soil moisture values correlate better with soil moisture observations when the ISBA LSM soil diffusion scheme is used. The Kalman gain is greater from the surface to 45 cm than below this limit. For dry periods, corrections introduced by the assimilation scheme mainly affect the first 15 cm of soil whereas weaker corrections impact the total soil column for wet periods. Such seasonal corrections cannot be described by the two-layer ISBA LSM. Sensitivity studies performed with the multilayer LSM show improved results when SSM (0–6 cm) is assimilated into the second layer (1–5 cm) than into the first layer (0–1 cm). The introduction of vertical correlations in the background error covariance matrix is also encouraging. Using a yearly cumulative distribution function (CDF)-matching scheme for bias correction instead of matching over the three years permits the seasonal variability of the soil moisture content to be better transcribed. An assimilation experiment has also been performed by forcing ISBA-DF (diffusion scheme) with a local forcing, setting precipitation to zero. This experiment shows the benefit of the SSM assimilation for correcting inaccurate atmospheric forcing.

A simplified Extended Kalman Filter for the global operational soil moisture analysis at ECMWF

AbstractA new land surface analysis system based on a simplified point‐wise Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) was implemented at the European Centre for Medium‐Range Weather Forecasts in the global operational Integrated Forecasting System (IFS) in November 2010. This system will allow consistent and optimal analyses of land surface parameters like soil moisture, surface temperatures, snow and vegetation properties. As part of the system implementation, the surface analysis structure has been revised to permit an independent and parallel computation with the upper‐air 4D‐Var analysis. The new analysis system is used for the soil moisture analysis, replacing the previous Optimal Interpolation (OI) scheme. Similar to the OI system, the simplified EKF uses 2 m air temperature and relative humidity observations from the SYNOP (land surface synoptic report) ground‐based networks to analyse soil moisture. This paper describes the new land surface analysis, its application for analysing soil moisture, and initial verification results which supported its operational implementation at ECMWF. The performance is evaluated based on a set of one‐year analysis experiments. The simplified EKF is compared to the OI, on soil moisture, 2 m temperature and relative humidity, showing a consistent improvement on screen‐level parameters and soil moisture forecasts. To demonstrate the potential of the new analysis scheme, soil moisture derived from ASCAT (Advanced Scatterometer) has been assimilated through the simplified EKF.

Assimilation of ASCAT near-surface soil moisture into the SIM hydrological model over France

Abstract. This study examines whether the assimilation of remotely sensed near-surface soil moisture observations might benefit an operational hydrological model, specifically Météo-France's SAFRAN-ISBA-MODCOU (SIM) model. Soil moisture data derived from ASCAT backscatter observations are assimilated into SIM using a Simplified Extended Kalman Filter (SEKF) over 3.5 years. The benefit of the assimilation is tested by comparison to a delayed cut-off version of SIM, in which the land surface is forced with more accurate atmospheric analyses, due to the availability of additional atmospheric observations after the near-real time data cut-off. However, comparing the near-real time and delayed cut-off SIM models revealed that the main difference between them is a dry bias in the near-real time precipitation forcing, which resulted in a dry bias in the root-zone soil moisture and associated surface moisture flux forecasts. While assimilating the ASCAT data did reduce the root-zone soil moisture dry bias (by nearly 50%), this was more likely due to a bias within the SEKF, than due to the assimilation having accurately responded to the precipitation errors. Several improvements to the assimilation are identified to address this, and a bias-aware strategy is suggested for explicitly correcting the model bias. However, in this experiment the moisture added by the SEKF was quickly lost from the model surface due to the enhanced surface fluxes (particularly drainage) induced by the wetter soil moisture states. Consequently, by the end of each winter, during which frozen conditions prevent the ASCAT data from being assimilated, the model land surface had returned to its original (dry-biased) climate. This highlights that it would be more effective to address the precipitation bias directly, than to correct it by constraining the model soil moisture through data assimilation.

Assimilation of Soil Wetness Index and Leaf Area Index into the ISBA-A-gs land surface model: grassland case study

Abstract. The performance of the joint assimilation in a land surface model of a Soil Wetness Index (SWI) product provided by an exponential filter together with Leaf Area Index (LAI) is investigated. The data assimilation is evaluated with different setups using the SURFEX modeling platform, for a period of seven years (2001–2007), at the SMOSREX grassland site in southwestern France. The results obtained with a Simplified Extended Kalman Filter demonstrate the effectiveness of a joint data assimilation scheme when both SWI and Leaf Area Index are merged into the ISBA-A-gs land surface model. The assimilation of a retrieved Soil Wetness Index product presents several challenges that are investigated in this study. A significant improvement of around 13 % of the root-zone soil water content is obtained by assimilating dimensionless root-zone SWI data. For comparison, the assimilation of in situ surface soil moisture is considered as well. A lower impact on the root zone is noticed. Under specific conditions, the transfer of the information from the surface to the root zone was found not accurate. Also, our results indicate that the assimilation of in situ LAI data may correct a number of deficiencies in the model, such as low LAI values in the senescence phase by using a seasonal-dependent error definition for background and observations. In order to verify the specification of the errors for SWI and LAI products, a posteriori diagnostics are employed. This approach highlights the importance of the assimilation design on the quality of the analysis. The impact of data assimilation scheme on CO2 fluxes is also quantified by using measurements of net CO2 fluxes gathered at the SMOSREX site from 2005 to 2007. An improvement of about 5 % in terms of rms error is obtained.

Cross-evaluation of modelled and remotely sensed surface soil moisture with in situ data in southwestern France

Abstract. The SMOSMANIA soil moisture network in Southwestern France is used to evaluate modelled and remotely sensed soil moisture products. The surface soil moisture (SSM) measured in situ at 5 cm permits to evaluate SSM from the SIM operational hydrometeorological model of Météo-France and to perform a cross-evaluation of the normalised SSM estimates derived from coarse-resolution (25 km) active microwave observations from the ASCAT scatterometer instrument (C-band, onboard METOP), issued by EUMETSAT and resampled to the Discrete Global Grid (DGG, 12.5 km gridspacing) by TU-Wien (Vienna University of Technology) over a two year period (2007–2008). A downscaled ASCAT product at one kilometre scale is evaluated as well, together with operational soil moisture products of two meteorological services, namely the ALADIN numerical weather prediction model (NWP) and the Integrated Forecasting System (IFS) analysis of Météo-France and ECMWF, respectively. In addition to the operational SSM analysis of ECMWF, a second analysis using a simplified extended Kalman filter and assimilating the ASCAT SSM estimates is tested. The ECMWF SSM estimates correlate better with the in situ observations than the Météo-France products. This may be due to the higher ability of the multi-layer land surface model used at ECMWF to represent the soil moisture profile. However, the SSM derived from SIM corresponds to a thin soil surface layer and presents good correlations with ASCAT SSM estimates for the very first centimetres of soil. At ECMWF, the use of a new data assimilation technique, which is able to use the ASCAT SSM, improves the SSM and the root-zone soil moisture analyses.