Using the numbering of objectives above, the main achievements of first reporting period are:
O1: tighter collaboration with the remote sensing community
Installing sensors used to measure Land-Surface Temperature (LST) and fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (fAPAR) were successfully carried out. Both variables are recognised by the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) as Essential Climate Variables (ECVs), a list of parameters for describing the Earth’s changing climate. These parameters are used by the remote sensing community for calibration and validation (cal/val) of satellite measurements. Another improvement towards remote sensing community was the work done within the framework of NUBICOS to automate the tasks of processing and quality control of total column measurements of CO2, CH₄, CO, and H2O using EM27/SUN spectrometers.
O2: Improving the value chain from observations to climate services
Development and release of the ICOS secondary quality control interface and quality assurance routine for QuinCe, a data reduction and quality control software initially developed to take care of observations of partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) and ancillary data. The QuinCe tool is being taken up by an increasing number of ICOS Ocean Principal Investigators (PIs) and is also making its way to users outside ICOS. The toolhas eased delivery of data to ICOS Carbon Portal and other data repositories such as SOCAT. These CO2 data represent an important contribution to the Global Carbon Budget.
Data streams in ICOS have been also significantly improved with a European ObsPack software package which quality control, merge, harmonise, and homogenise data sent to WMO WDCGG (World Data Centre for Greenhouse Gases). This improved data pipeline is important for increasing the visibility of ICOS data.
O3: strengthened national nodes and improved staff skills;
Community engagement portal development in close connection with the community. An interactive web portal with educational materials and pre-defined content highlights depending on the role of the user has been planned and developed. The portal is designed to become an easy-access source of all needed ICOS-related documents, guidelines, onboarding materials and contact info for the community users. Three domain-specific surveys (Atmosphere, Ecosystem, Ocean) were conducted to assess community expectations, needs, and perceptions related to the portal. The content and portal architecture has been planned according to the results of these community surveys. The portal will strengthen the skills of all members of the ICOS community by enabling fast and easy access to the most often used resources and materials.
O4: Global integration
Strengthening global cooperation and improving interoperability among major greenhouse gas (GHG) monitoring networks, Mace Head supersite intercomparison involves the four leading laboratories in the world (from New Zealand, USA and Germany) In intercomparisons of data processing workflows, comparison between ICOS and Advanced Global Atmospheric Gases Experiment (AGAGE) greenhouse gas data processing chains. The study systematically documented and quantified the effects of quality control and non-linear calibration procedures. The work provides a methodological prototype for future ICOS–NOAA intercomparisons (in RP2). All this contributes to quantifying the sources of uncertainty in global datasets.
Work with Analysis of the specific challenges for monitoring GHG in the tropics (D4.5) and Automatic EM27 data processing (D1.1) both support more efficient and timely data collection in currently underobserved areas. The 2024 ICOS Summer School, executed in close co-operation with WMO, had several participants from the Global South
