Preliminary Results of Nearshore Ice and Water Level Monitoring in Arctic Using Single Antenna Ground-Based Reflectometry

We present an efficient ground-based GNSS-Reflectometry (GNSS-R) algorithm as well as experimental results to estimate water level as well as detect the presence of sea ice in the Arctic region. Our work enables the use of cost effective GNSS receivers to increase the spatial and temporal resolution in monitoring water level and sea ice in the Arctic. GNSS-R based sea level estimation during non-ice, calm sea state is accurate with error ranging between 0 – 3 cm (± 2 – 4 cm standard deviation) for all GNSS constellations when processed individually. During rough sea state period, we could detect the sea state from Confidence Level of Retrieval (CLR) whose value drops to less than 5; CLR is usually well above 10 during calm sea state. Our algorithm detects the onset and withdrawal of sea ice with CLR average value during ice-free period nominally less than 20 but increases to 30 and above from the onset of ice in the middle of December till its withdrawal in the end of May. We also validated our water level and sea ice/snow estimates with laser surveying, and they are in good agreement.