Geodetic sensitivity to surface meteorological data: 24-h and 6-h observing sessions

Tests have been performed to assess the utility of surface meteorological measurements for improved geodetic performance. Three types of a priori met data are considered: a default global, seasonal model; local met measurements collected at a subset of the test network; output values from a NOAA Forecast Systems Lab assimilation model. A variety of configurations for handling tropospheric parameters in the geodetic solutions is also considered. We find no geodetic advantage in using the measured met data under any test scenario. Differences among the three types of a priori information are generally insignificant, although biases can be introduced when some troposphere parameters are not adjusted. Even when using only a relatively small network (<100 km) the differences remain minor. When observing sessions are reduced from 24 h to 6 h the increased error due to measurement noise obscures all other effects except for the shortest baselines where some advantage may be achieved by not adjusting troposphere parameters for very close station pairs.