Articles | Volume 18, issue 10
https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-7787-2026
© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-7787-2026
© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Data description article
| 
29 Oct 2026
Data description article |
| 29 Oct 2026
| 29 Oct 2026
The Global Gravity-based Groundwater Product (G3P)
GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
Institute of Environmental Science and Geography, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, 14476, Germany
Ehsan Sharifi
GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research-Troposphere Research (IMK-TRO), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Karlsruhe, 76131, Germany
Julian Haas
GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
Eva Boergens
GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
Feifei Cao
International Groundwater Resources Assessment Centre IGRAC, Delft, 2611 AX, the Netherlands
Christoph Dahle
GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
Neda Darbeheshti
Astronomical Institute, University Bern, Bern, 3012, Switzerland
Geoscience Australia, Canberra, 2601, Australia
Henryk Dobslaw
GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
Inés Dussaillant
Department of Geography, University of Zurich, Zurich, 8057, Switzerland
Center for Earth and Space, Facultad de Ingeniería y Ciencias, Universidad Adolfo Ibañez, Santiago, 7941169, Chile
Wouter Dorigo
Department of Geodesy and Geoinformation, TU Wien, Vienna, 1040, Austria
Frank Flechtner
GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
Adrian Jäggi
Astronomical Institute, University Bern, Bern, 3012, Switzerland
Miriam Kosmale
Finnish Meteorological Institute, FMI, Arctic Space Center, Helsinki, 00560, Finland
Martin Lasser
Astronomical Institute, University Bern, Bern, 3012, Switzerland
Kari Luojus
Finnish Meteorological Institute, FMI, Arctic Space Center, Helsinki, 00560, Finland
Ulrich Meyer
Astronomical Institute, University Bern, Bern, 3012, Switzerland
Adam Pasik
Department of Geodesy and Geoinformation, TU Wien, Vienna, 1040, Austria
Wolfgang Preimesberger
Department of Geodesy and Geoinformation, TU Wien, Vienna, 1040, Austria
Claudia Ruz Vargas
International Groundwater Resources Assessment Centre IGRAC, Delft, 2611 AX, the Netherlands
Michael Zemp
Department of Geography, University of Zurich, Zurich, 8057, Switzerland
Related authors
Daniel Rasche, Cosimo Brogi, Markus Köhli, David McJannet, Jannis Weimar, Martin Schrön, Theresa Blume, and Andreas Güntner
Geosci. Instrum. Method. Data Syst., 15, 291–321, https://doi.org/10.5194/gi-15-291-2026, https://doi.org/10.5194/gi-15-291-2026, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
Cosmic-Ray Neutron Sensing is a passive technique to estimate soil moisture, plant traits and snow at the field scale by using instruments sensitive to different neutron energy ranges. For devices sensitive to lower energies, a generalised assessment of the signal response under varying environmental conditions is currently missing. Our simulation-based study highlights the differing signal response of different instruments to environmental variables and provides a baseline for further research.
Roland Hohensinn, Junyang Gou, Ulrich Meyer, Vincent Humphrey, Wouter Dorigo, Eva Boergens, Benedikt Soja, Alexander Gruber, Laura Jensen, Annette Eicker, Michael Rast, and Andreas Güntner
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-975, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-975, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
This study provides a statistically traceable, uncertainty-aware assessment of global terrestrial and groundwater storage trends based on 21.5 years of GRACE/-FO observations using the Global Gravity-based Groundwater Product (G3P). By accounting for long-range memory and interannual variability, we isolate robust trends from climate variability and noise. The analysis refines continental budgets and identifies emerging groundwater gains alongside widespread persistent decline.
Ehsan Sharifi, Julian Haas, Eva Boergens, Henryk Dobslaw, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 6985–6998, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6985-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6985-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
This study presents a method to make the spatial resolution of global Water Storage Compartments (WSCs) compatible with terrestrial water storage (TWS) data from Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment (GRACE) missions. The method compares the spatial structure of the WSCs and TWS by considering the correlation between neighboring grid cells. An isotropic Gaussian filter with an optimal filter width of 250 km is found to be the most suitable, ensuring compatibility for consistent comparison with GRACE data in hydrological applications.
Howlader Mohammad Mehedi Hasan, Petra Döll, Seyed-Mohammad Hosseini-Moghari, Fabrice Papa, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 567–596, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-567-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-567-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We calibrate a global hydrological model using multiple observations to analyse the benefits and trade-offs of multi-variable calibration. We found such an approach to be very important for understanding the real-world system. However, some observations are very essential to the system, in particular, streamflow. We also showed uncertainties in the calibration results, which are often useful for making informed decisions. We emphasize considering observation uncertainty in model calibration.
Eva Boergens, Andreas Güntner, Mike Sips, Christian Schwatke, and Henryk Dobslaw
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4733–4754, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4733-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4733-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The satellites GRACE and GRACE-FO observe continental terrestrial water storage (TWS) changes. With over 20 years of data, we can look into long-term variations in the East Africa Rift region. We focus on analysing the interannual TWS variations compared to meteorological data and observations of the water storage compartments. We found strong influences of natural precipitation variability and human actions over Lake Victoria's water level.
Daniel Rasche, Theresa Blume, and Andreas Güntner
SOIL, 10, 655–677, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-655-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-655-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Soil moisture measurements at the field scale are highly beneficial for numerous (soil) hydrological applications. Cosmic-ray neutron sensing (CRNS) allows for the non-invasive monitoring of field-scale soil moisture across several hectares but only for the first few tens of centimetres of the soil. In this study, we modify and test a simple modeling approach to extrapolate CRNS-derived surface soil moisture information down to 450 cm depth and compare calibrated and uncalibrated model results.
Petra Döll, Howlader Mohammad Mehedi Hasan, Kerstin Schulze, Helena Gerdener, Lara Börger, Somayeh Shadkam, Sebastian Ackermann, Seyed-Mohammad Hosseini-Moghari, Hannes Müller Schmied, Andreas Güntner, and Jürgen Kusche
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2259–2295, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2259-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2259-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Currently, global hydrological models do not benefit from observations of model output variables to reduce and quantify model output uncertainty. For the Mississippi River basin, we explored three approaches for using both streamflow and total water storage anomaly observations to adjust the parameter sets in a global hydrological model. We developed a method for considering the observation uncertainties to quantify the uncertainty of model output and provide recommendations.
Daniel Rasche, Jannis Weimar, Martin Schrön, Markus Köhli, Markus Morgner, Andreas Güntner, and Theresa Blume
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 3059–3082, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3059-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3059-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We introduce passive downhole cosmic-ray neutron sensing (d-CRNS) as an approach for the non-invasive estimation of soil moisture in deeper layers of the unsaturated zone which exceed the observational window of above-ground CRNS applications. Neutron transport simulations are used to derive mathematical descriptions and transfer functions, while experimental measurements in an existing groundwater observation well illustrate the feasibility and applicability of the approach.
Maik Heistermann, Till Francke, Lena Scheiffele, Katya Dimitrova Petrova, Christian Budach, Martin Schrön, Benjamin Trost, Daniel Rasche, Andreas Güntner, Veronika Döpper, Michael Förster, Markus Köhli, Lisa Angermann, Nikolaos Antonoglou, Manuela Zude-Sasse, and Sascha E. Oswald
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 15, 3243–3262, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-3243-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-3243-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Cosmic-ray neutron sensing (CRNS) allows for the non-invasive estimation of root-zone soil water content (SWC). The signal observed by a single CRNS sensor is influenced by the SWC in a radius of around 150 m (the footprint). Here, we have put together a cluster of eight CRNS sensors with overlapping footprints at an agricultural research site in north-east Germany. That way, we hope to represent spatial SWC heterogeneity instead of retrieving just one average SWC estimate from a single sensor.
Daniel Blank, Annette Eicker, Laura Jensen, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2413–2435, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2413-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2413-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Soil moisture (SM), a key variable of the global water cycle, is analyzed using two types of satellite observations; microwave sensors measure the top few centimeters and satellite gravimetry (GRACE) the full vertical water column. As SM can change very fast, non-standard daily GRACE data are applied for the first time for this analysis. Jointly analyzing these data gives insight into the SM dynamics at different soil depths, and time shifts indicate the infiltration time into deeper layers.
Maik Heistermann, Heye Bogena, Till Francke, Andreas Güntner, Jannis Jakobi, Daniel Rasche, Martin Schrön, Veronika Döpper, Benjamin Fersch, Jannis Groh, Amol Patil, Thomas Pütz, Marvin Reich, Steffen Zacharias, Carmen Zengerle, and Sascha Oswald
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 14, 2501–2519, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-2501-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-2501-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
This paper presents a dense network of cosmic-ray neutron sensing (CRNS) to measure spatio-temporal soil moisture patterns during a 2-month campaign in the Wüstebach headwater catchment in Germany. Stationary, mobile, and airborne CRNS technology monitored the root-zone water dynamics as well as spatial heterogeneity in the 0.4 km2 area. The 15 CRNS stations were supported by a hydrogravimeter, biomass sampling, and a wireless soil sensor network to facilitate holistic hydrological analysis.
Andreas Wieser, Andreas Güntner, Peter Dietrich, Jan Handwerker, Dina Khordakova, Uta Ködel, Martin Kohler, Hannes Mollenhauer, Bernhard Mühr, Erik Nixdorf, Marvin Reich, Christian Rolf, Martin Schrön, Claudia Schütze, and Ute Weber
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2022-131, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2022-131, 2022
Preprint withdrawn
Short summary
Short summary
We present an event-triggered observation concept which covers the entire process chain from heavy precipitation to flooding at the catchment scale. It combines flexible and mobile observing systems out of the fields of meteorology, hydrology and geophysics with stationary networks to capture atmospheric transport processes, heterogeneous precipitation patterns, land surface and subsurface storage processes, and runoff dynamics.
Heye Reemt Bogena, Martin Schrön, Jannis Jakobi, Patrizia Ney, Steffen Zacharias, Mie Andreasen, Roland Baatz, David Boorman, Mustafa Berk Duygu, Miguel Angel Eguibar-Galán, Benjamin Fersch, Till Franke, Josie Geris, María González Sanchis, Yann Kerr, Tobias Korf, Zalalem Mengistu, Arnaud Mialon, Paolo Nasta, Jerzy Nitychoruk, Vassilios Pisinaras, Daniel Rasche, Rafael Rosolem, Hami Said, Paul Schattan, Marek Zreda, Stefan Achleitner, Eduardo Albentosa-Hernández, Zuhal Akyürek, Theresa Blume, Antonio del Campo, Davide Canone, Katya Dimitrova-Petrova, John G. Evans, Stefano Ferraris, Félix Frances, Davide Gisolo, Andreas Güntner, Frank Herrmann, Joost Iwema, Karsten H. Jensen, Harald Kunstmann, Antonio Lidón, Majken Caroline Looms, Sascha Oswald, Andreas Panagopoulos, Amol Patil, Daniel Power, Corinna Rebmann, Nunzio Romano, Lena Scheiffele, Sonia Seneviratne, Georg Weltin, and Harry Vereecken
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 14, 1125–1151, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-1125-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-1125-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Monitoring of increasingly frequent droughts is a prerequisite for climate adaptation strategies. This data paper presents long-term soil moisture measurements recorded by 66 cosmic-ray neutron sensors (CRNS) operated by 24 institutions and distributed across major climate zones in Europe. Data processing followed harmonized protocols and state-of-the-art methods to generate consistent and comparable soil moisture products and to facilitate continental-scale analysis of hydrological extremes.
Tina Trautmann, Sujan Koirala, Nuno Carvalhais, Andreas Güntner, and Martin Jung
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 1089–1109, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-1089-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-1089-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
We assess the effect of how vegetation is defined in a global hydrological model on the composition of total water storage (TWS). We compare two experiments, one with globally uniform and one with vegetation parameters that vary in space and time. While both experiments are constrained against observational data, we found a drastic change in the partitioning of TWS, highlighting the important role of the interaction between groundwater–soil moisture–vegetation in understanding TWS variations.
Daniel Rasche, Markus Köhli, Martin Schrön, Theresa Blume, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 6547–6566, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-6547-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-6547-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
Cosmic-ray neutron sensing provides areal average soil moisture measurements. We investigated how distinct differences in spatial soil moisture patterns influence the soil moisture estimates and present two approaches to improve the estimate of soil moisture close to the instrument by reducing the influence of soil moisture further afield. Additionally, we show that the heterogeneity of soil moisture can be assessed based on the relationship of different neutron energies.
Daniel Rasche, Cosimo Brogi, Markus Köhli, David McJannet, Jannis Weimar, Martin Schrön, Theresa Blume, and Andreas Güntner
Geosci. Instrum. Method. Data Syst., 15, 291–321, https://doi.org/10.5194/gi-15-291-2026, https://doi.org/10.5194/gi-15-291-2026, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
Cosmic-Ray Neutron Sensing is a passive technique to estimate soil moisture, plant traits and snow at the field scale by using instruments sensitive to different neutron energy ranges. For devices sensitive to lower energies, a generalised assessment of the signal response under varying environmental conditions is currently missing. Our simulation-based study highlights the differing signal response of different instruments to environmental variables and provides a baseline for further research.
Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Moritz Clemens Müller, Raul Lezameta, Sophia Walther, Matthias Forkel, and Wouter Dorigo
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-6254, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-6254, 2026
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Biogeosciences (BG).
Short summary
Short summary
We developed a satellite-based method to estimate how much carbon plants take up through photosynthesis worldwide from 2002 to 2020. Using microwave observations, land cover and machine learning, we found that land-cover information improved estimates most, while deeper soil moisture better captured water-related changes in short vegetation. The approach complements existing products, but the total amount of plant carbon uptake remains uncertain.
Diaa Sheishah, Enas Abdelsamei, Viktoria Blanka-Vegi, Károly Barta, Ahmed M. Ali, Khaldoun Abualhin, Djamil Al-Halbouni, Wouter Dorigo, and Gyorgy Sipos
Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2026-563, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2026-563, 2026
Preprint under review for ESSD
Short summary
Short summary
Soil moisture controls drought, crop water supply, and groundwater recharge, but it is difficult to monitor below the surface. We used national monitoring data from 117 stations and six soil depths to build an open database that links soil moisture, soil type, water retention, and expected electromagnetic responses. The results identify a key mid-depth buffering zone and provide a practical reference for future drought monitoring, irrigation planning, and non-invasive soil-water surveys.
Jawairia A. Ahmad, Christopher M. Taylor, Bethan L. Harris, Dávid D. Kovács, Seonaid Anderson, Adrià Amell, Colin Moldenhauer, Steven Wells, and Wouter Dorigo
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-4687, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-4687, 2026
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (HESS).
Short summary
Short summary
Evaluating the ability of satellite-observed soil moisture products to represent fine-scale land surface information shows that active microwave radar based product from ASCAT captures spatial variability at fine resolution which passive microwave based products miss. Rainfall dataset evaluation using fine-scale soil moisture information highlights the limitations in ERA5 precipitation. Further, fine-scale soil moisture information improves nowcasting of convective storms over dry regions.
Linus Shihora, Laura Jensen, Eva Boergens, Volker Klemann, Robert Dill, Ingo Sasgen, Bert Wouters, Marius Schlaak, Jeanne Sauber-Rosenberg, Shin-Chan Han, Yoshiyuki Tanaka, Carla Braitenberg, Muhammad Tahir Javed, Gerardo Maurizio, Hugo Lecomte, Andrey Babeyko, Niels Hovius, and Henryk Dobslaw
Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2026-576, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2026-576, 2026
Preprint under review for ESSD
Short summary
Short summary
Satellite gravimetry measures Earth's gravity in order to track water, ice, and air redistributions across the Earth. The new ESA Earth System Model 3.0 is a simulated dataset of these mass changes and designed to perform simulation studies of upcoming satellite missions which assess their capabilities to detect various signals. The dataset includes an update of the simulated atmosphere, oceans, hydrology, solid Earth, sea-level changes, earthquakes and selected regional signals.
Alejandro Blazquez, Benoit Meyssignac, Robin Fraudeau, Michael Ablain, Jonathan Bamber, Antonio Bonaduce, Marie Bouih, Anny Cazenave, Thorben Döhne, Ines Dussaillant, Ramiro Ferrari, Martin Horwath, Nicolas Kolodziejczyk, Hugo Lecomte, Stephanie Leroux, William Llovel, Daniele Melini, Erwan Oulhen, Thierry Penduff, Roshin P. Raj, Giorgio Spada, Marius Schlaak, Papasarafianou Stamatia, Andrea Storto, Chunxue Yang, and Sarah Connors
Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2026-627, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2026-627, 2026
Preprint under review for ESSD
Short summary
Short summary
Closing the sea‑level budget on annual and longer time scales is a cornerstone of physical oceanography because sea‑level rise is one of the best indicators of climate change, and a closed budget shows we have identified and quantified all major drivers. We examined it from 1993 to 2022, finding an accelerated rise that matched ice melt and warm water until 2015. Afterwards an unexplained gap appears. Better deep‑ocean observations and refined gravity processing are needed to close the budget.
Julia Pfeffer, Benoît Meyssignac, Rory Bingham, Alejandro Blazquez, Marie Bouih, Carla Braitenberg, Luca Brocca, Henryk Dobslaw, Ramiro Ferrari, Ehsan Forootan, Helena Gerdener, Muhammad Tahir Javed, Laura Jensen, Volker Klemann, Anna Kremer, Jürgen Kusche, Gilles Larnicol, Muhammad Usman Liaqat, Francesco Leopardi, Elisavet-Maria Mamagiannou, Gerardo Maurizio, Roland Pail, Isabelle Panet, Thomas Papanikolaou, Peyman Saemian, Ingo Sasgen, Maike Schumacher, Marius Schlaak, Linus Shihora, Alireza Sobouti, Nico Sneeuw, Mohammad Javad Tourian, Dimitrios Tsoulis, Georgios Vergos, Bert Wouters, Fan Yang, and Ilias Daras
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-4642, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-4642, 2026
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Earth Observation (EO).
Short summary
Short summary
The ESA SING project demonstrates how the future satellite gravity missions NGGM and MAGIC will improve observations of continental water storage, oceans, glaciers, sea level, earthquakes, and climate change. Their more accurate, higher-resolution gravity measurements will enhance Earth system monitoring, improve climate and hazard assessments, and strengthen operational services for water management, disaster preparedness, and environmental decision-making.
Martin Hirschi, Dominik Michel, Dominik L. Schumacher, Wolfgang Preimesberger, and Sonia I. Seneviratne
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 18, 4855–4870, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-4855-2026, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-4855-2026, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
Drier summers and more frequent droughts were experienced in Switzerland in the last two decades. We present a comprehensive set of in situ soil moisture measurements from the Swiss Soil Moisture Experiment (SwissSMEX) network, covering the period 2010–2025. We document recent measures that have been taken to secure the network and its long-term time series. We use this curated data to analyse reported drying trends.
Pierre Laluet, Jacopo Dari, Louise Busschaert, Zdenko Heyvaert, Gabrielle De Lannoy, Pia Langhans, Sara Modanesi, Christian Massari, Luca Brocca, Carla Saltalippi, Renato Morbidelli, Clément Albergel, and Wouter Dorigo
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 18, 4833–4853, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-4833-2026, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-4833-2026, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
We developed a long-term dataset collection of irrigation water use based on about two decades of satellite observations, three distinct approaches, and many input datasets. The collection provides monthly estimates for major agricultural regions and helps describe how irrigation varies across locations, seasons, and years. It offers a foundation for improving how irrigation is quantified, compared across methods, and integrated into large-scale hydrological and climate studies.
Jiahui Qiu, Kari Luojus, Harri Kaartinen, Yubao Qiu, Jari Silander, Epari Ritesh Patro, Björn Klöve, and Ali Torabi Haghighi
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 18, 2703–2722, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-2703-2026, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-18-2703-2026, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
We developed a 24-year record revealing how river ice on the six largest Arctic rivers has changed under a warming climate. Using satellite images from the MODIS Terra and Aqua sensors, we monitored daily ice cover and seasonal freeze-up and breakup timing. On average, over 65 % of river segments show later freeze-up (~ 9 d), earlier breakup (~ 8 d), and shorter ice seasons (~ 14 d), revealing a clear signal of rapid warming across Arctic river systems.
Oscar M. Baez-Villanueva, Alfredo Crespo-Otero, Sara Modanesi, Pierre Laluet, Sergio Vicente-Serrano, Jaap Schellekens, Jacopo Dari, Hylke E. Beck, Wouter Dorigo, Christian Massari, Chiara Corbari, Joppe Massant, Kwint Delbare, Olivier Bonte, Aaron Boone, Diego Fernández-Prieto, and Diego G. Miralles
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-1856, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-1856, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
We developed a new method to estimate daily land evaporation at high resolution across the Iberian Peninsula, explicitly accounting for irrigation. By combining satellite and meteorological data, we show that irrigation can strongly increase evaporation in agricultural areas. The results better match ground observations and improve understanding of water use. This approach can support farming decisions and water management at the regional scale, and will be extended to global applications.
Ehsan Modiri, Oldrich Rakovec, Pallav Kumar Shrestha, Almudena García-García, Leandro Avila, Katie Blackford, Elizabeth Cooper, Bram Droppers, Paolo Filippucci, Milan Fischer, Matěj Orság, Pietro Stradiotti, Luca Brocca, Douglas B. Clark, Wouter Dorigo, Stefan Kollet, Jian Peng, Niko Wanders, and Luis Samaniego
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-1012, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-1012, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
Drought impacts water supply, agriculture, and ecosystems, yet hydrological models often disagree on when and where drought occurs. This study tested whether satellite observations can improve how models represent soil moisture drought in the Rhine River basin. Using several models and major drought events, we show that satellite data improve spatial realism and reveal important differences among models, helping to better understand uncertainty in drought monitoring and early warning.
Pierre Laluet, Chiara Corbari, Oscar Baez-Villanueva, Sophia Walther, Yongqiang Zhang, Joaquín Muñoz-Sabater, Clément Albergel, and Wouter Dorigo
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 30, 1779–1799, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-30-1779-2026, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-30-1779-2026, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
We examined how well global datasets estimate evapotranspiration, the water moving from land to the air, in irrigated areas. We compared six widely used products with irrigation maps, satellite estimates, and field measurements across different climate regions. Some datasets better capture irrigation effects, especially those using temperature and vegetation satellite data. This work helps guide dataset selection and supports better inclusion of irrigation in hydrological and climate models.
Roland Hohensinn, Junyang Gou, Ulrich Meyer, Vincent Humphrey, Wouter Dorigo, Eva Boergens, Benedikt Soja, Alexander Gruber, Laura Jensen, Annette Eicker, Michael Rast, and Andreas Güntner
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-975, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-975, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
This study provides a statistically traceable, uncertainty-aware assessment of global terrestrial and groundwater storage trends based on 21.5 years of GRACE/-FO observations using the Global Gravity-based Groundwater Product (G3P). By accounting for long-range memory and interannual variability, we isolate robust trends from climate variability and noise. The analysis refines continental budgets and identifies emerging groundwater gains alongside widespread persistent decline.
Ehsan Sharifi, Julian Haas, Eva Boergens, Henryk Dobslaw, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 6985–6998, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6985-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6985-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
This study presents a method to make the spatial resolution of global Water Storage Compartments (WSCs) compatible with terrestrial water storage (TWS) data from Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment (GRACE) missions. The method compares the spatial structure of the WSCs and TWS by considering the correlation between neighboring grid cells. An isotropic Gaussian filter with an optimal filter width of 250 km is found to be the most suitable, ensuring compatibility for consistent comparison with GRACE data in hydrological applications.
Bethan L. Harris, Christopher M. Taylor, Wouter Dorigo, Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Darren Ghent, and Iván Noguera
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 6917–6933, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6917-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6917-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
An improved understanding of land-atmosphere coupling processes during flash (rapid-onset) droughts is needed to aid the development of forecasts for these events. We use satellite observations to investigate the surface energy budget during flash droughts globally. The most intense events show a perturbed surface energy budget months before onset. In some regions, vegetation observations 1–2 months before onset provide information on the likelihood of heat extremes during an event.
Pinja Venäläinen, Colleen Mortimer, Kari Luojus, Lawrence Mudryk, Matias Takala, and Jouni Pulliainen
The Cryosphere, 19, 6301–6318, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-19-6301-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-19-6301-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Satellite data-based estimation of large snow water equivalent (SWE) values can be improved with bias correction. This study updates the bias correction method by using updated snow course data, extending correction to two new months. Additionally, bias correction is expanded from a monthly to a daily time scale. The daily bias correction offers more accurate hemispheric snow mass estimation, aligning well with reanalysis data.
Ella Kivimäki, Maria Tenkanen, Tuula Aalto, Michael Buchwitz, Kari Luojus, Jouni Pulliainen, Kimmo Rautiainen, Oliver Schneising, Anu-Maija Sundström, Johanna Tamminen, Aki Tsuruta, and Hannakaisa Lindqvist
Biogeosciences, 22, 5193–5230, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-5193-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-5193-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We study how environmental variables influencing natural methane fluxes explain the seasonal variability in satellite-observed methane in Northern Hemisphere high-latitude wetland areas. Using two atmospheric model set-ups, we assess consistency with satellite data. Methane loss through reaction with hydroxyl radicals and links with snow cover, temperature, and snowmelt had the strongest influence. Our study highlights the value of satellite observations for understanding large-scale wetland emissions.
Wolfgang Preimesberger, Pietro Stradiotti, and Wouter Dorigo
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 17, 4305–4329, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-4305-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-4305-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We introduce the official ESA CCI Soil Moisture GAPFILLED climate data record. A univariate interpolation algorithm is applied to predict missing data points without relying on ancillary variables. The dataset includes gap-free uncertainty estimates for all predictions and was validated with independent in situ reference measurements. Our data record is recommended for applications which require global long-term gap-free satellite soil moisture data.
Çağatay Çakan, M. Tuğrul Yılmaz, Henryk Dobslaw, E. Sinem Ince, Fatih Evrendilek, Christoph Förste, and Ali Levent Yagci
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 3359–3377, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-3359-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-3359-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
The study assesses the Global Precipitation Climatology Centre (GPCC) and Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) precipitation products by estimating hydrological drought recovery time (DRT) using satellite gravimetry data, Jet Propulsion Laboratory mass concentration solution (JPL mascon), and Global Gravity-based Groundwater Project (G3P) terrestrial water storage (TWS) products. The findings reveal that DRTs from GPCC and GPCP are comparable, and JPL mascon shows longer DRT, while G3P demonstrates greater consistency. These results contribute to a deeper understanding of precipitation and water storage dynamics and are essential for meteorological and hydrological research.
Linus Shihora, Torge Martin, Anna Christina Hans, Rebecca Hummels, Michael Schindelegger, and Henryk Dobslaw
Ocean Sci., 21, 1533–1548, https://doi.org/10.5194/os-21-1533-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/os-21-1533-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is a major part of the ocean circulation. Satellite gravimetry missions, like GRACE, which measure changes in Earth's mass distribution, could help monitor changes in the AMOC by detecting variations in ocean bottom pressure. To help assess if future satellite missions could detect these changes, we used ocean model simulation data to study their connection. Additionally, we created a synthetic data set for future satellite mission simulations.
Inés Dussaillant, Romain Hugonnet, Matthias Huss, Etienne Berthier, Jacqueline Bannwart, Frank Paul, and Michael Zemp
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 17, 1977–2006, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-1977-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-1977-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Our research observes glacier mass changes worldwide from 1976 to 2024, revealing an alarming increase in melt, especially in the last decade and the record year of 2023. By combining field and satellite observations, we provide annual mass changes for all glaciers in the world, showing significant contributions to global sea level rise. This work underscores the need for ongoing local monitoring and global climate action to mitigate the effects of glacier loss and its broader environmental impacts.
Wolfgang Knorr, Matthew Williams, Tea Thum, Thomas Kaminski, Michael Voßbeck, Marko Scholze, Tristan Quaife, T. Luke Smallman, Susan C. Steele-Dunne, Mariette Vreugdenhil, Tim Green, Sönke Zaehle, Mika Aurela, Alexandre Bouvet, Emanuel Bueechi, Wouter Dorigo, Tarek S. El-Madany, Mirco Migliavacca, Marika Honkanen, Yann H. Kerr, Anna Kontu, Juha Lemmetyinen, Hannakaisa Lindqvist, Arnaud Mialon, Tuuli Miinalainen, Gaétan Pique, Amanda Ojasalo, Shaun Quegan, Peter J. Rayner, Pablo Reyes-Muñoz, Nemesio Rodríguez-Fernández, Mike Schwank, Jochem Verrelst, Songyan Zhu, Dirk Schüttemeyer, and Matthias Drusch
Geosci. Model Dev., 18, 2137–2159, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-2137-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-2137-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
When it comes to climate change, the land surface is where the vast majority of impacts happen. The task of monitoring those impacts across the globe is formidable and must necessarily rely on satellites – at a significant cost: the measurements are only indirect and require comprehensive physical understanding. We have created a comprehensive modelling system that we offer to the research community to explore how satellite data can be better exploited to help us capture the changes that happen on our lands.
Christoph Dahle, Eva Boergens, Ingo Sasgen, Thorben Döhne, Sven Reißland, Henryk Dobslaw, Volker Klemann, Michael Murböck, Rolf König, Robert Dill, Mike Sips, Ulrike Sylla, Andreas Groh, Martin Horwath, and Frank Flechtner
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 17, 611–631, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-611-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-611-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
GRACE and GRACE-FO are unique observing systems to quantify mass changes at the Earth’s surface from space. Time series of these mass changes are of high value for various applications, e.g., in hydrology, glaciology, and oceanography. GravIS (Gravity Information Service) provides easy access to user-friendly, regularly updated mass anomaly products. The portal visualizes and describes these data, aiming to highlight their significance for understanding changes in the climate system.
Howlader Mohammad Mehedi Hasan, Petra Döll, Seyed-Mohammad Hosseini-Moghari, Fabrice Papa, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 567–596, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-567-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-567-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We calibrate a global hydrological model using multiple observations to analyse the benefits and trade-offs of multi-variable calibration. We found such an approach to be very important for understanding the real-world system. However, some observations are very essential to the system, in particular, streamflow. We also showed uncertainties in the calibration results, which are often useful for making informed decisions. We emphasize considering observation uncertainty in model calibration.
Martin Hirschi, Pietro Stradiotti, Bas Crezee, Wouter Dorigo, and Sonia I. Seneviratne
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 397–425, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-397-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-397-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We investigate the potential of long-term satellite and reanalysis products for characterising soil drying by analysing their 2000–2022 soil moisture trends and their representation of agroecological drought events of this period. Soil moisture trends are globally diverse and partly contradictory between products. This also affects the products' drought-detection capacity. Based on the best-estimate products, consistent soil drying is observed over more than 40 % of the land area covered.
Eva Boergens, Andreas Güntner, Mike Sips, Christian Schwatke, and Henryk Dobslaw
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4733–4754, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4733-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4733-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The satellites GRACE and GRACE-FO observe continental terrestrial water storage (TWS) changes. With over 20 years of data, we can look into long-term variations in the East Africa Rift region. We focus on analysing the interannual TWS variations compared to meteorological data and observations of the water storage compartments. We found strong influences of natural precipitation variability and human actions over Lake Victoria's water level.
Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Leander Moesinger, Robin van der Schalie, Mariette Vreugdenhil, Wolfgang Preimesberger, Thomas Frederikse, Richard de Jeu, and Wouter Dorigo
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 16, 4573–4617, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-16-4573-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-16-4573-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
VODCA v2 is a dataset providing vegetation indicators for long-term ecosystem monitoring. VODCA v2 comprises two products: VODCA CXKu, spanning 34 years of observations (1987–2021), suitable for monitoring upper canopy dynamics, and VODCA L (2010–2021), for above-ground biomass monitoring. VODCA v2 has lower noise levels than the previous product version and provides valuable insights into plant water dynamics and biomass changes, even in areas where optical data are limited.
Daniel Rasche, Theresa Blume, and Andreas Güntner
SOIL, 10, 655–677, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-655-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-655-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Soil moisture measurements at the field scale are highly beneficial for numerous (soil) hydrological applications. Cosmic-ray neutron sensing (CRNS) allows for the non-invasive monitoring of field-scale soil moisture across several hectares but only for the first few tens of centimetres of the soil. In this study, we modify and test a simple modeling approach to extrapolate CRNS-derived surface soil moisture information down to 450 cm depth and compare calibrated and uncalibrated model results.
Livia Piermattei, Michael Zemp, Christian Sommer, Fanny Brun, Matthias H. Braun, Liss M. Andreassen, Joaquín M. C. Belart, Etienne Berthier, Atanu Bhattacharya, Laura Boehm Vock, Tobias Bolch, Amaury Dehecq, Inés Dussaillant, Daniel Falaschi, Caitlyn Florentine, Dana Floricioiu, Christian Ginzler, Gregoire Guillet, Romain Hugonnet, Matthias Huss, Andreas Kääb, Owen King, Christoph Klug, Friedrich Knuth, Lukas Krieger, Jeff La Frenierre, Robert McNabb, Christopher McNeil, Rainer Prinz, Louis Sass, Thorsten Seehaus, David Shean, Désirée Treichler, Anja Wendt, and Ruitang Yang
The Cryosphere, 18, 3195–3230, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-18-3195-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-18-3195-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Satellites have made it possible to observe glacier elevation changes from all around the world. In the present study, we compared the results produced from two different types of satellite data between different research groups and against validation measurements from aeroplanes. We found a large spread between individual results but showed that the group ensemble can be used to reliably estimate glacier elevation changes and related errors from satellite data.
Petra Döll, Howlader Mohammad Mehedi Hasan, Kerstin Schulze, Helena Gerdener, Lara Börger, Somayeh Shadkam, Sebastian Ackermann, Seyed-Mohammad Hosseini-Moghari, Hannes Müller Schmied, Andreas Güntner, and Jürgen Kusche
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2259–2295, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2259-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2259-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Currently, global hydrological models do not benefit from observations of model output variables to reduce and quantify model output uncertainty. For the Mississippi River basin, we explored three approaches for using both streamflow and total water storage anomaly observations to adjust the parameter sets in a global hydrological model. We developed a method for considering the observation uncertainties to quantify the uncertainty of model output and provide recommendations.
Neda Darbeheshti, Martin Lasser, Ulrich Meyer, Daniel Arnold, and Adrian Jäggi
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 16, 1589–1599, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-16-1589-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-16-1589-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This paper discusses strategies to improve the GRACE gravity field monthly solutions computed at the Astronomical Institute of the University of Bern. We updated the input observations and background models, as well as improving processing strategies in terms of instrument data screening and instrument parameterization.
Kerttu Kouki, Kari Luojus, and Aku Riihelä
The Cryosphere, 17, 5007–5026, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-17-5007-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-17-5007-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We evaluated snow cover properties in state-of-the-art reanalyses (ERA5 and ERA5-Land) with satellite-based datasets. Both ERA5 and ERA5-Land overestimate snow mass, whereas albedo estimates are more consistent between the datasets. Snow cover extent (SCE) is accurately described in ERA5-Land, while ERA5 shows larger SCE than the satellite-based datasets. The trends in snow mass, SCE, and albedo are mostly negative in 1982–2018, and the negative trends become more apparent when spring advances.
Samuel Scherrer, Gabriëlle De Lannoy, Zdenko Heyvaert, Michel Bechtold, Clement Albergel, Tarek S. El-Madany, and Wouter Dorigo
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 4087–4114, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-4087-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-4087-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We explored different options for data assimilation (DA) of the remotely sensed leaf area index (LAI). We found strong biases between LAI predicted by Noah-MP and observations. LAI DA that does not take these biases into account can induce unphysical patterns in the resulting LAI and flux estimates and leads to large changes in the climatology of root zone soil moisture. We tested two bias-correction approaches and explored alternative solutions to treating bias in LAI DA.
Adam Pasik, Alexander Gruber, Wolfgang Preimesberger, Domenico De Santis, and Wouter Dorigo
Geosci. Model Dev., 16, 4957–4976, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-4957-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-4957-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We apply the exponential filter (EF) method to satellite soil moisture retrievals to estimate the water content in the unobserved root zone globally from 2002–2020. Quality assessment against an independent dataset shows satisfactory results. Error characterization is carried out using the standard uncertainty propagation law and empirically estimated values of EF model structural uncertainty and parameter uncertainty. This is followed by analysis of temporal uncertainty variations.
Daniel Rasche, Jannis Weimar, Martin Schrön, Markus Köhli, Markus Morgner, Andreas Güntner, and Theresa Blume
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 3059–3082, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3059-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3059-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We introduce passive downhole cosmic-ray neutron sensing (d-CRNS) as an approach for the non-invasive estimation of soil moisture in deeper layers of the unsaturated zone which exceed the observational window of above-ground CRNS applications. Neutron transport simulations are used to derive mathematical descriptions and transfer functions, while experimental measurements in an existing groundwater observation well illustrate the feasibility and applicability of the approach.
Maik Heistermann, Till Francke, Lena Scheiffele, Katya Dimitrova Petrova, Christian Budach, Martin Schrön, Benjamin Trost, Daniel Rasche, Andreas Güntner, Veronika Döpper, Michael Förster, Markus Köhli, Lisa Angermann, Nikolaos Antonoglou, Manuela Zude-Sasse, and Sascha E. Oswald
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 15, 3243–3262, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-3243-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-3243-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Cosmic-ray neutron sensing (CRNS) allows for the non-invasive estimation of root-zone soil water content (SWC). The signal observed by a single CRNS sensor is influenced by the SWC in a radius of around 150 m (the footprint). Here, we have put together a cluster of eight CRNS sensors with overlapping footprints at an agricultural research site in north-east Germany. That way, we hope to represent spatial SWC heterogeneity instead of retrieving just one average SWC estimate from a single sensor.
Daniel Blank, Annette Eicker, Laura Jensen, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2413–2435, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2413-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2413-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Soil moisture (SM), a key variable of the global water cycle, is analyzed using two types of satellite observations; microwave sensors measure the top few centimeters and satellite gravimetry (GRACE) the full vertical water column. As SM can change very fast, non-standard daily GRACE data are applied for the first time for this analysis. Jointly analyzing these data gives insight into the SM dynamics at different soil depths, and time shifts indicate the infiltration time into deeper layers.
Karina von Schuckmann, Audrey Minière, Flora Gues, Francisco José Cuesta-Valero, Gottfried Kirchengast, Susheel Adusumilli, Fiammetta Straneo, Michaël Ablain, Richard P. Allan, Paul M. Barker, Hugo Beltrami, Alejandro Blazquez, Tim Boyer, Lijing Cheng, John Church, Damien Desbruyeres, Han Dolman, Catia M. Domingues, Almudena García-García, Donata Giglio, John E. Gilson, Maximilian Gorfer, Leopold Haimberger, Maria Z. Hakuba, Stefan Hendricks, Shigeki Hosoda, Gregory C. Johnson, Rachel Killick, Brian King, Nicolas Kolodziejczyk, Anton Korosov, Gerhard Krinner, Mikael Kuusela, Felix W. Landerer, Moritz Langer, Thomas Lavergne, Isobel Lawrence, Yuehua Li, John Lyman, Florence Marti, Ben Marzeion, Michael Mayer, Andrew H. MacDougall, Trevor McDougall, Didier Paolo Monselesan, Jan Nitzbon, Inès Otosaka, Jian Peng, Sarah Purkey, Dean Roemmich, Kanako Sato, Katsunari Sato, Abhishek Savita, Axel Schweiger, Andrew Shepherd, Sonia I. Seneviratne, Leon Simons, Donald A. Slater, Thomas Slater, Andrea K. Steiner, Toshio Suga, Tanguy Szekely, Wim Thiery, Mary-Louise Timmermans, Inne Vanderkelen, Susan E. Wjiffels, Tonghua Wu, and Michael Zemp
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 15, 1675–1709, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-1675-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-1675-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Earth's climate is out of energy balance, and this study quantifies how much heat has consequently accumulated over the past decades (ocean: 89 %, land: 6 %, cryosphere: 4 %, atmosphere: 1 %). Since 1971, this accumulated heat reached record values at an increasing pace. The Earth heat inventory provides a comprehensive view on the status and expectation of global warming, and we call for an implementation of this global climate indicator into the Paris Agreement’s Global Stocktake.
Remi Madelon, Nemesio J. Rodríguez-Fernández, Hassan Bazzi, Nicolas Baghdadi, Clement Albergel, Wouter Dorigo, and Mehrez Zribi
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 1221–1242, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1221-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1221-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We present an approach to estimate soil moisture (SM) at 1 km resolution using Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-3 satellites. The estimates were compared to other high-resolution (HR) datasets over Europe, northern Africa, Australia, and North America, showing good agreement. However, the discrepancies between the different HR datasets and their lower performances compared with in situ measurements and coarse-resolution datasets show the remaining challenges for large-scale HR SM mapping.
Luisa Schmidt, Matthias Forkel, Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Samuel Scherrer, Wouter A. Dorigo, Alexander Kuhn-Régnier, Robin van der Schalie, and Marta Yebra
Biogeosciences, 20, 1027–1046, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-20-1027-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-20-1027-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Vegetation attenuates natural microwave emissions from the land surface. The strength of this attenuation is quantified as the vegetation optical depth (VOD) parameter and is influenced by the vegetation mass, structure, water content, and observation wavelength. Here we model the VOD signal as a multi-variate function of several descriptive vegetation variables. The results help in understanding the effects of ecosystem properties on VOD.
Taylor Smith, Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Chris A. Boulton, Timothy M. Lenton, Wouter Dorigo, and Niklas Boers
Earth Syst. Dynam., 14, 173–183, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-14-173-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-14-173-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Multi-instrument records with varying signal-to-noise ratios are becoming increasingly common as legacy sensors are upgraded, and data sets are modernized. Induced changes in higher-order statistics such as the autocorrelation and variance are not always well captured by cross-calibration schemes. Here we investigate using synthetic examples how strong resulting biases can be and how they can be avoided in order to make reliable statements about changes in the resilience of a system.
Pinja Venäläinen, Kari Luojus, Colleen Mortimer, Juha Lemmetyinen, Jouni Pulliainen, Matias Takala, Mikko Moisander, and Lina Zschenderlein
The Cryosphere, 17, 719–736, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-17-719-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-17-719-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Snow water equivalent (SWE) is a valuable characteristic of snow cover. In this research, we improve the radiometer-based GlobSnow SWE retrieval methodology by implementing spatially and temporally varying snow densities into the retrieval procedure. In addition to improving the accuracy of SWE retrieval, varying snow densities were found to improve the magnitude and seasonal evolution of the Northern Hemisphere snow mass estimate compared to the baseline product.
Matthias Forkel, Luisa Schmidt, Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Wouter Dorigo, and Marta Yebra
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 39–68, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-39-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-39-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
The live fuel moisture content (LFMC) of vegetation canopies is a driver of wildfires. We investigate the relation between LFMC and passive microwave satellite observations of vegetation optical depth (VOD) and develop a method to estimate LFMC from VOD globally. Our global VOD-based estimates of LFMC can be used to investigate drought effects on vegetation and fire risks.
Leander Moesinger, Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Robin van der Schalie, Tracy Scanlon, Richard de Jeu, and Wouter Dorigo
Biogeosciences, 19, 5107–5123, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-5107-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-5107-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
The standardized vegetation optical depth index (SVODI) can be used to monitor the vegetation condition, such as whether the vegetation is unusually dry or wet. SVODI has global coverage, spans the past 3 decades and is derived from multiple spaceborne passive microwave sensors of that period. SVODI is based on a new probabilistic merging method that allows the merging of normally distributed data even if the data are not gap-free.
Robin van der Schalie, Mendy van der Vliet, Clément Albergel, Wouter Dorigo, Piotr Wolski, and Richard de Jeu
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 3611–3627, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-3611-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-3611-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Climate data records of surface soil moisture, vegetation optical depth, and land surface temperature can be derived from passive microwave observations. The ability of these datasets to properly detect anomalies and extremes is very valuable in climate research and can especially help to improve our insight in complex regions where the current climate reanalysis datasets reach their limitations. Here, we present a case study over the Okavango Delta, where we focus on inter-annual variability.
Maik Heistermann, Heye Bogena, Till Francke, Andreas Güntner, Jannis Jakobi, Daniel Rasche, Martin Schrön, Veronika Döpper, Benjamin Fersch, Jannis Groh, Amol Patil, Thomas Pütz, Marvin Reich, Steffen Zacharias, Carmen Zengerle, and Sascha Oswald
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 14, 2501–2519, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-2501-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-2501-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
This paper presents a dense network of cosmic-ray neutron sensing (CRNS) to measure spatio-temporal soil moisture patterns during a 2-month campaign in the Wüstebach headwater catchment in Germany. Stationary, mobile, and airborne CRNS technology monitored the root-zone water dynamics as well as spatial heterogeneity in the 0.4 km2 area. The 15 CRNS stations were supported by a hydrogravimeter, biomass sampling, and a wireless soil sensor network to facilitate holistic hydrological analysis.
Andreas Wieser, Andreas Güntner, Peter Dietrich, Jan Handwerker, Dina Khordakova, Uta Ködel, Martin Kohler, Hannes Mollenhauer, Bernhard Mühr, Erik Nixdorf, Marvin Reich, Christian Rolf, Martin Schrön, Claudia Schütze, and Ute Weber
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2022-131, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2022-131, 2022
Preprint withdrawn
Short summary
Short summary
We present an event-triggered observation concept which covers the entire process chain from heavy precipitation to flooding at the catchment scale. It combines flexible and mobile observing systems out of the fields of meteorology, hydrology and geophysics with stationary networks to capture atmospheric transport processes, heterogeneous precipitation patterns, land surface and subsurface storage processes, and runoff dynamics.
Kerttu Kouki, Petri Räisänen, Kari Luojus, Anna Luomaranta, and Aku Riihelä
The Cryosphere, 16, 1007–1030, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-1007-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-1007-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
We analyze state-of-the-art climate models’ ability to describe snow mass and whether biases in modeled temperature or precipitation can explain the discrepancies in snow mass. In winter, biases in precipitation are the main factor affecting snow mass, while in spring, biases in temperature becomes more important, which is an expected result. However, temperature or precipitation cannot explain all snow mass discrepancies. Other factors, such as models’ structural errors, are also significant.
Heye Reemt Bogena, Martin Schrön, Jannis Jakobi, Patrizia Ney, Steffen Zacharias, Mie Andreasen, Roland Baatz, David Boorman, Mustafa Berk Duygu, Miguel Angel Eguibar-Galán, Benjamin Fersch, Till Franke, Josie Geris, María González Sanchis, Yann Kerr, Tobias Korf, Zalalem Mengistu, Arnaud Mialon, Paolo Nasta, Jerzy Nitychoruk, Vassilios Pisinaras, Daniel Rasche, Rafael Rosolem, Hami Said, Paul Schattan, Marek Zreda, Stefan Achleitner, Eduardo Albentosa-Hernández, Zuhal Akyürek, Theresa Blume, Antonio del Campo, Davide Canone, Katya Dimitrova-Petrova, John G. Evans, Stefano Ferraris, Félix Frances, Davide Gisolo, Andreas Güntner, Frank Herrmann, Joost Iwema, Karsten H. Jensen, Harald Kunstmann, Antonio Lidón, Majken Caroline Looms, Sascha Oswald, Andreas Panagopoulos, Amol Patil, Daniel Power, Corinna Rebmann, Nunzio Romano, Lena Scheiffele, Sonia Seneviratne, Georg Weltin, and Harry Vereecken
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 14, 1125–1151, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-1125-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-1125-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Monitoring of increasingly frequent droughts is a prerequisite for climate adaptation strategies. This data paper presents long-term soil moisture measurements recorded by 66 cosmic-ray neutron sensors (CRNS) operated by 24 institutions and distributed across major climate zones in Europe. Data processing followed harmonized protocols and state-of-the-art methods to generate consistent and comparable soil moisture products and to facilitate continental-scale analysis of hydrological extremes.
Benjamin Wild, Irene Teubner, Leander Moesinger, Ruxandra-Maria Zotta, Matthias Forkel, Robin van der Schalie, Stephen Sitch, and Wouter Dorigo
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 14, 1063–1085, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-1063-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-1063-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Gross primary production (GPP) describes the conversion of CO2 to carbohydrates and can be seen as a filter for our atmosphere of the primary greenhouse gas CO2. We developed VODCA2GPP, a GPP dataset that is based on vegetation optical depth from microwave remote sensing and temperature. Thus, it is mostly independent from existing GPP datasets and also available in regions with frequent cloud coverage. Analysis showed that VODCA2GPP is able to complement existing state-of-the-art GPP datasets.
Tina Trautmann, Sujan Koirala, Nuno Carvalhais, Andreas Güntner, and Martin Jung
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 1089–1109, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-1089-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-1089-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
We assess the effect of how vegetation is defined in a global hydrological model on the composition of total water storage (TWS). We compare two experiments, one with globally uniform and one with vegetation parameters that vary in space and time. While both experiments are constrained against observational data, we found a drastic change in the partitioning of TWS, highlighting the important role of the interaction between groundwater–soil moisture–vegetation in understanding TWS variations.
Stefan Schlaffer, Marco Chini, Wouter Dorigo, and Simon Plank
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 841–860, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-841-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-841-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Prairie wetlands are important for biodiversity and water availability. Knowledge about their variability and spatial distribution is of great use in conservation and water resources management. In this study, we propose a novel approach for the classification of small water bodies from satellite radar images and apply it to our study area over 6 years. The retrieved dynamics show the different responses of small and large wetlands to dry and wet periods.
Daniel Rasche, Markus Köhli, Martin Schrön, Theresa Blume, and Andreas Güntner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 6547–6566, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-6547-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-6547-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
Cosmic-ray neutron sensing provides areal average soil moisture measurements. We investigated how distinct differences in spatial soil moisture patterns influence the soil moisture estimates and present two approaches to improve the estimate of soil moisture close to the instrument by reducing the influence of soil moisture further afield. Additionally, we show that the heterogeneity of soil moisture can be assessed based on the relationship of different neutron energies.
Wouter Dorigo, Irene Himmelbauer, Daniel Aberer, Lukas Schremmer, Ivana Petrakovic, Luca Zappa, Wolfgang Preimesberger, Angelika Xaver, Frank Annor, Jonas Ardö, Dennis Baldocchi, Marco Bitelli, Günter Blöschl, Heye Bogena, Luca Brocca, Jean-Christophe Calvet, J. Julio Camarero, Giorgio Capello, Minha Choi, Michael C. Cosh, Nick van de Giesen, Istvan Hajdu, Jaakko Ikonen, Karsten H. Jensen, Kasturi Devi Kanniah, Ileen de Kat, Gottfried Kirchengast, Pankaj Kumar Rai, Jenni Kyrouac, Kristine Larson, Suxia Liu, Alexander Loew, Mahta Moghaddam, José Martínez Fernández, Cristian Mattar Bader, Renato Morbidelli, Jan P. Musial, Elise Osenga, Michael A. Palecki, Thierry Pellarin, George P. Petropoulos, Isabella Pfeil, Jarrett Powers, Alan Robock, Christoph Rüdiger, Udo Rummel, Michael Strobel, Zhongbo Su, Ryan Sullivan, Torbern Tagesson, Andrej Varlagin, Mariette Vreugdenhil, Jeffrey Walker, Jun Wen, Fred Wenger, Jean Pierre Wigneron, Mel Woods, Kun Yang, Yijian Zeng, Xiang Zhang, Marek Zreda, Stephan Dietrich, Alexander Gruber, Peter van Oevelen, Wolfgang Wagner, Klaus Scipal, Matthias Drusch, and Roberto Sabia
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 5749–5804, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-5749-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-5749-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
The International Soil Moisture Network (ISMN) is a community-based open-access data portal for soil water measurements taken at the ground and is accessible at https://ismn.earth. Over 1000 scientific publications and thousands of users have made use of the ISMN. The scope of this paper is to inform readers about the data and functionality of the ISMN and to provide a review of the scientific progress facilitated through the ISMN with the scope to shape future research and operations.
Cited articles
Abich, K., Abramovici, A., Amparan, B., Baatzsch, A., Okihiro, B. B., Barr, D. C., Bize, M. P., Bogan, C., Braxmaier, C., Burke, M. J., Clark, K. C., Dahl, C., Dahl, K., Danzmann, K., Davis, M. A., de Vine, G., Dickson, J. A., Dubovitsky, S., Eckardt, A., Ester, T., Barranco, G. F., Flatscher, R., Flechtner, F., Folkner, W. M., Francis, S., Gilbert, M. S., Gilles, F., Gohlke, M., Grossard, N., Guenther, B., Hager, P., Hauden, J., Heine, F., Heinzel, G., Herding, M., Hinz, M., Howell, J., Katsumura, M., Kaufer, M., Klipstein, W., Koch, A., Kruger, M., Larsen, K., Lebeda, A., Lebeda, A., Leikert, T., Liebe, C. C., Liu, J., Lobmeyer, L., Mahrdt, C., Mangoldt, T., McKenzie, K., Misfeldt, M., Morton, P. R., Müller, V., Murray, A. T., Nguyen, D. J., Nicklaus, K., Pierce, R., Ravich, J. A., Reavis, G., Reiche, J., Sanjuan, J., Schütze, D., Seiter, C., Shaddock, D., Sheard, B., Sileo, M., Spero, R., Spiers, G., Stede, G., Stephens, M., Sutton, A., Trinh, J., Voss, K., Wang, D., Wang, R. T., Ware, B., Wegener, H., Windisch, S., Woodruff, C., Zender, B., and Zimmermann, M.: In-Orbit Performance of the GRACE Follow-on Laser Ranging Interferometer, Phys. Rev. Lett., 123, https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.123.031101, 2019.
Adams, K. H., Reager, J. T., Rosen, P., Wiese, D. N., Farr, T. G., Rao, S., Haines, B. J., Argus, D. F., Liu, Z., Smith, R., Famiglietti, J. S., and Rodell, M.: Remote Sensing of Groundwater: Current Capabilities and Future Directions, Water Resour. Res., 58, https://doi.org/10.1029/2022wr032219, 2022.
Akl, M. and Thomas, B. F.: Challenges in applying water budget framework for estimating groundwater storage changes from GRACE observations, J. Hydrol., 639, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2024.131600, 2024.
Albergel, C., Rüdiger, C., Pellarin, T., Calvet, J.-C., Fritz, N., Froissard, F., Suquia, D., Petitpa, A., Piguet, B., and Martin, E.: From near-surface to root-zone soil moisture using an exponential filter: an assessment of the method based on in-situ observations and model simulations, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 12, 1323–1337, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-12-1323-2008, 2008.
Ali, S., Wang, Q. M., Liu, D., Fu, Q., Rahaman, M. M., Faiz, M. A., and Cheema, M. J. M.: Estimation of spatio-temporal groundwater storage variations in the Lower Transboundary Indus Basin using GRACE satellite, J. Hydrol., 605, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2021.127315, 2022.
Arifin, A., Shamsudduha, M., Ramdhan, A. M., Rateb, A., Scanlon, B. R., Setiawan, T., Iman, M. I., Husna, A., and Taylor, R. G.: Plausibility Criteria for GRACE-Derived Groundwater Storage Changes From Aquifers Globally, Geophys. Res. Lett., 52, https://doi.org/10.1029/2025gl118580, 2025.
Behzadpour, S., Mayer-Gürr, T., and Krauss, S.: GRACE Follow-On Accelerometer Data Recovery, J. Geophys. Res.-Sol. Ea., 126, https://doi.org/10.1029/2020jb021297, 2021.
Berthier, E., Floriciou, D., Gardner, A. S., Gourmelen, N., Jakob, L., Paul, F., Treichler, D., Wouters, B., Belart, J. M. C., Dehecq, A., Dussaillant, I., Hugonnet, R., Kääb, A., Krieger, L., Pálsson, F., and Zemp, M.: Measuring glacier mass changes from space-a review, Rep. Prog. Phys., 86, https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6633/acaf8e, 2023.
Bierkens, M. F. P. and Wada, Y.: Non-renewable groundwater use and groundwater depletion: a review, Environ. Res. Lett., 14, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab1a5f, 2019.
Boergens, E., Dobslaw, H., Dill, R., Thomas, M., Dahle, C., Murböck, M., and Flechtner, F.: Modelling spatial covariances for terrestrial water storage variations verified with synthetic GRACE-FO data, GEM – International Journal on Geomathematics, 11, 24, https://doi.org/10.1007/s13137-020-00160-0, 2020.
Boergens, E., Kvas, A., Eicker, A., Dobslaw, H., Schawohl, L., Dahle, C., Murbock, M., and Flechtner, F.: Uncertainties of GRACE-Based Terrestrial Water Storage Anomalies for Arbitrary Averaging Regions, J. Geophys. Res.-Sol. Ea., 127, https://doi.org/10.1029/2021jb022081, 2022.
Bojinski, S., Verstraete, M., Peterson, T. C., Richter, C., Simmons, A., and Zemp, M.: The concept of essential climate variables in support of climate research, applications, and policy, B. Am. Meteorol. Soc., 95, 1431–1443, https://doi.org/10.1175/bams-d-13-00047.1, 2014.
Brown, R. D., Fang, B., and Mudryk, L.: Update of Canadian Historical Snow Survey Data and Analysis of Snow Water Equivalent Trends, 1967–2016 Research Note, Atmos. Ocean, 57, 149–156, https://doi.org/10.1080/07055900.2019.1598843, 2019.
Bulygina, O. N., Groisman, P. Y., Razuvaev, V. N., and Korshunova, N. N.: Changes in snow cover characteristics over Northern Eurasia since 1966, Environ. Res. Lett., 6, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/6/4/045204, 2011.
C3S CDR: Lake water levels from 1992 to present derived from satellite observation, Climate Data Store [data set], https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.5714c668, 2020.
C3S CDR: Glaciers distribution data from the Randolph Glacier Inventory for year 2000, Climate Data Store [data set], https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.553f1387 2024.
Chandanpurkar, H. A., Famiglietti, J. S., Gopalan, K., Wiese, D. N., Wada, Y., Kakinuma, K., Reager, J. T., and Zhang, F.: Unprecedented continental drying, shrinking freshwater availability, and increasing land contributions to sea level rise, Science Advances, 11, https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adx0298, 2025.
Chen, J. L., Famiglietti, J. S., Scanlon, B. R., and Rodell, M.: Groundwater Storage Changes: Present Status from GRACE Observations, Surv. Geophys., 37, 397–417, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10712-015-9332-4, 2016.
Choulga, M., Moschini, F., Mazzetti, C., Grimaldi, S., Disperati, J., Beck, H., Salamon, P., and Prudhomme, C.: Technical note: Surface fields for global environmental modelling, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2991–3036, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2991-2024, 2024.
Collischonn, W., Allasia, D., Da Silva, B. C., and Tucci, C. E. M.: The MGB-IPH model for large-scale rainfall-runoff modelling, Hydrolog. Sci. J., 52, 878–895, https://doi.org/10.1623/hysj.52.5.878, 2007.
Contoux, C., Violette, S., Vivona, R., Goblet, P., and Patriarche, D.: How basin model results enable the study of multi-layer aquifer response to pumping: the Paris Basin, France, Hydrogeol. J., 21, 545–557, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10040-013-0955-6, 2013.
Crétaux, J. F., Bergé-Nguyen, M., Calmant, S., Jamangulova, N., Satylkanov, R., Lyard, F., Perosanz, F., Verron, J., Montazem, A. S., Le Guilcher, G., Leroux, D., Barrie, J., Maisongrande, P., and Bonnefond, P.: Absolute Calibration or Validation of the Altimeters on the Sentinel-3A and the Jason-3 over Lake Issykkul (Kyrgyzstan), Remote Sens., 10, https://doi.org/10.3390/rs10111679, 2018.
Cuthbert, M. O., Gleeson, T., Moosdorf, N., Befus, K. M., Schneider, A., Hartmann, J., and Lehner, B.: Global patterns and dynamics of climate-groundwater interactions, Nat. Clim. Change, 9, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0386-4, 2019.
Dahle, C., Boergens, E., Sasgen, I., Döhne, T., Reißland, S., Dobslaw, H., Klemann, V., Murböck, M., König, R., Dill, R., Sips, M., Sylla, U., Groh, A., Horwath, M., and Flechtner, F.: GravIS: mass anomaly products from satellite gravimetry, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 17, 611–631, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-611-2025, 2025.
Daras, I., March, G., Pail, R., Hughes, C. W., Braitenberg, C., Güntner, A., Eicker, A., Wouters, B., Heller-Kaikov, B., Pivetta, T., and Pastorutti, A.: Mass-change And Geosciences International Constellation (MAGIC) expected impact on science and applications, Geophys. J. Int., 236, 1288–1308, https://doi.org/10.1093/gji/ggad472, 2024.
De Santis, D. and Biondi, D.: Error Propagation from Remotely Sensed Surface Soil Moisture Into Soil Water Index Using an Exponential Filter, HIC 2018, 13th International Conference on Hydroinformatics, 520–525, https://doi.org/10.29007/kvhb, 2018.
Dennehy, K. F.: High Plains regional ground-water study (No. 091-00), Fact Sheet., U.S. Geological Survey, https://doi.org/10.3133/fs09100, 2000.
Dobslaw, H., Bergmann-Wolf, I., Dill, R., Poropat, L., Thomas, M., Dahle, C., Esselborn, S., König, R., and Flechtner, F.: A new high-resolution model of non-tidal atmosphere and ocean mass variability for de-aliasing of satellite gravity observations: AOD1B RL06, Geophys. J. Int., 211, 263–269, https://doi.org/10.1093/gji/ggx302, 2017.
Dorigo, W., Preimesberger, W., Reimer, C., Van der Schalie, R., Pasik, A., De Jeu, R., and Paulik, C.: Soil moisture gridded data from 1978 to present, Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) Climate Data Store (CDS) [data set], https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.d7782f18 2018.
Dorigo, W., Dietrich, S., Aires, F., Brocca, L., Carter, S., Cretaux, J. F., Dunkerley, D., Enomoto, H., Forsberg, R., Güntner, A., Hegglin, M. I., Hollmann, R., Hurst, D. F., Johannessen, J. A., Kummerow, C., Lee, T., Luojus, K., Looser, U., Miralles, D. G., Pellet, V., Recknagel, T., Vargas, C. R., Schneider, U., Schoeneich, P., Schröder, M., Tapper, N., Vuglinsky, V., Wagner, W., Yu, L. S., Zappa, L., Zemp, M., and Aich, V.: Closing the Water Cycle from Observations across Scales: Where Do We Stand?, B. Am. Meteorol. Soc., 102, E1897–E1935, https://doi.org/10.1175/bams-d-19-0316.1, 2021a.
Dorigo, W., Himmelbauer, I., Aberer, D., Schremmer, L., Petrakovic, I., Zappa, L., Preimesberger, W., Xaver, A., Annor, F., Ardö, J., Baldocchi, D., Bitelli, M., Blöschl, G., Bogena, H., Brocca, L., Calvet, J.-C., Camarero, J. J., Capello, G., Choi, M., Cosh, M. C., van de Giesen, N., Hajdu, I., Ikonen, J., Jensen, K. H., Kanniah, K. D., de Kat, I., Kirchengast, G., Kumar Rai, P., Kyrouac, J., Larson, K., Liu, S., Loew, A., Moghaddam, M., Martínez Fernández, J., Mattar Bader, C., Morbidelli, R., Musial, J. P., Osenga, E., Palecki, M. A., Pellarin, T., Petropoulos, G. P., Pfeil, I., Powers, J., Robock, A., Rüdiger, C., Rummel, U., Strobel, M., Su, Z., Sullivan, R., Tagesson, T., Varlagin, A., Vreugdenhil, M., Walker, J., Wen, J., Wenger, F., Wigneron, J. P., Woods, M., Yang, K., Zeng, Y., Zhang, X., Zreda, M., Dietrich, S., Gruber, A., van Oevelen, P., Wagner, W., Scipal, K., Drusch, M., and Sabia, R.: The International Soil Moisture Network: serving Earth system science for over a decade, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 5749–5804, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-5749-2021, 2021b.
Dussaillant, I., Bannwart, J., Paul, F., and Zemp, M.: Glacier mass change global gridded data from 1976 to present derived from the Fluctuations of Glaciers Database, World Glacier Monitoring Service, Climate Data Store [data set], https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.ba597449, 2023.
Dussaillant, I., Hugonnet, R., Huss, M., Berthier, E., Bannwart, J., Paul, F., and Zemp, M.: Annual mass change of the world's glaciers from 1976 to 2024 by temporal downscaling of satellite data with in situ observations, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 17, 1977–2006, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-1977-2025, 2025.
Eicker, A., Schawohl, L., Middendorf, K., Bagge, M., Jensen, L., and Dobslaw, H.: Influence of GIA Uncertainty on Climate Model Evaluation With GRACE/GRACE-FO Satellite Gravimetry Data, J. Geophys. Res.-Sol. Ea., 129, https://doi.org/10.1029/2023jb027769, 2024.
Fan, Y., Miguez-Macho, G., Jobbágy, E. G., Jackson, R. B., and Otero-Casal, C.: Hydrologic regulation of plant rooting depth, P. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 114, 10572–10577, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1712381114, 2017.
Flechtner, F., Neumayer, K. H., Dahle, C., Dobslaw, H., Fagiolini, E., Raimondo, J. C., and Guntner, A.: What Can be Expected from the GRACE-FO Laser Ranging Interferometer for Earth Science Applications?, Surv. Geophys., 37, 453–470, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10712-015-9338-y, 2016.
Frappart, F. and Ramillien, G.: Monitoring Groundwater Storage Changes Using the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) Satellite Mission: A Review, Remote Sens., 10, https://doi.org/10.3390/rs10060829, 2018.
Garcia, D.: Robust smoothing of gridded data in one and higher dimensions with missing values, Comput. Stat. Data An., 54, 1167–1178, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.csda.2009.09.020, 2010.
Gelaro, R., McCarty, W., Suárez, M. J., Todling, R., Molod, A., Takacs, L., Randles, C. A., Darmenov, A., Bosilovich, M. G., Reichle, R., Wargan, K., Coy, L., Cullather, R., Draper, C., Akella, S., Buchard, V., Conaty, A., da Silva, A. M., Gu, W., Kim, G. K., Koster, R., Lucchesi, R., Merkova, D., Nielsen, J. E., Partyka, G., Pawson, S., Putman, W., Rienecker, M., Schubert, S. D., Sienkiewicz, M., and Zhao, B.: The Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, Version 2 (MERRA-2), J. Climate, 30, 5419–5454, https://doi.org/10.1175/jcli-d-16-0758.1, 2017.
Getirana, A., Kumar, S., and Rodell, M.: Inconsistencies in GRACE-Based Groundwater Storage Estimation-A Call for a Proper Use of Land Surface Models, Geophys. Res. Lett., 52, 10.1029/2025gl119197, 2025.
Gleeson, T., Befus, K. M., Jasechko, S., Luijendijk, E., and Cardenas, M. B.: The global volume and distribution of modern groundwater, Nat. Geosci., 9, https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2590, 2016.
Gonçalves, R. D., Teramoto, E. H., and Chang, H. K.: Regional Groundwater Modeling of the Guarani Aquifer System, Water, 12, https://doi.org/10.3390/w12092323, 2020.
Gruber, A., Scanlon, T., van der Schalie, R., Wagner, W., and Dorigo, W.: Evolution of the ESA CCI Soil Moisture climate data records and their underlying merging methodology, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 11, 717–739, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-11-717-2019, 2019.
Gruber, A., Su, C. H., Zwieback, S., Crowd, W., Dorigo, W., and Wagner, W.: Recent advances in (soil moisture) triple collocation analysis, Int. J. Appl. Earth Obs., 45, 200–211, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jag.2015.09.002, 2016.
Güntner, A., Schmidt, R., and Döll, P.: Supporting large-scale hydrogeological monitoring and modelling by time-variable gravity data, Hydrogeol. J., 15, 167–170, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10040-006-0089-1, 2007.
Güntner, A., Sharifi, E., Haas, J., Boergens, E., Dahle, C., Dobslaw, H., Dorigo, W., Dussailant, I., Flechtner, F., Jäggi, A., Kosmale, M., Luojus, K., Mayer-Gürr, T., Meyer, U., Preimesberger, W., Ruz Vargas, C., and Zemp, M.: Global Gravity-based Groundwater Product (G3P) V. 1.12, GFZ Data Services [data set], https://doi.org/10.5880/g3p.2024.001, 2024.
Guo, X. M., Fang, X. Q., Cao, Y., Yang, L. L., Ren, L. L., Chen, Y. H., and Zhang, X. X.: Reconstruction of ESA CCI soil moisture based on DCT-PLS and in situ soil moisture, Hydrol. Res., https://doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.058, 2022.
Haberkorn, A.: European Snow Booklet – an Inventory of Snow Measurements in Europe, EnviDat [data set], https://doi.org/10.16904/envidat.59, 2019.
Habets, F., Boé, J., Déqué, M., Ducharne, A., Gascoin, S., Hachour, A., Martin, E., Pagé, C., Sauquet, E., Terray, L., Thiéry, D., Oudin, L., and Viennot, P.: Impact of climate change on the hydrogeology of two basins in northern France, Climatic Change, 121, 771-785, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-013-0934-x, 2013.
Hersbach, H., Bell, B., Berrisford, P., Hirahara, S., Horányi, A., Muñoz-Sabater, J., Nicolas, J., Peubey, C., Radu, R., Schepers, D., Simmons, A., Soci, C., Abdalla, S., Abellan, X., Balsamo, G., Bechtold, P., Biavati, G., Bidlot, J., Bonavita, M., De Chiara, G., Dahlgren, P., Dee, D., Diamantakis, M., Dragani, R., Flemming, J., Forbes, R., Fuentes, M., Geer, A., Haimberger, L., Healy, S., Hogan, R. J., Hólm, E., Janisková, M., Keeley, S., Laloyaux, P., Lopez, P., Lupu, C., Radnoti, G., de Rosnay, P., Rozum, I., Vamborg, F., Villaume, S., and Thépaut, J. N.: The ERA5 global reanalysis, Q. J. Roy. Meteor. Soc., 146, 1999-2049, https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.3803, 2020.
Hirata, R. and Foster, S.: The Guarani Aquifer System - from regional reserves to local use, Q. J. Eng. Geol. Hydroge., 54, https://doi.org/10.1144/qjegh2020-091, 2021.
Hirschi, M., Mueller, B., Dorigo, W., and Seneviratne, S. I.: Using remotely sensed soil moisture for land-atmosphere coupling diagnostics: The role of surface vs. root-zone soil moisture variability, Remote Sens. Environ., 154, 246–252, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2014.08.030, 2014.
Hohensinn, R., Gou, J., Meyer, U., Humphrey, V., Dorigo, W., Boergens, E., Soja, B., Gruber, A., Jensen, L., Eicker, A., Rast, M., and Güntner, A.: Water storage trends derived from the GRACE/-FO global gravity-based groundwater product (G3P), EGUsphere [preprint], https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-975, 2026.
Horvath, A., Murböck, M., Pail, R., and Horwath, M.: Decorrelation of GRACE Time Variable Gravity Field Solutions Using Full Covariance Information, Geosciences, 8, 323, https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences8090323, 2018.
Hosseini, M. and Kerachian, R.: A data fusion-based methodology for optimal redesign of groundwater monitoring networks, J. Hydrol., 552, 267–282, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2017.06.046, 2017.
Hou, J., Van Dijk, A. I. J. M., Renzullo, L. J., and Larraondo, P. R.: GloLakes: water storage dynamics for 27 000 lakes globally from 1984 to present derived from satellite altimetry and optical imaging, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 16, 201–218, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-16-201-2024, 2024.
Huggins, X., Gleeson, T., Famiglietti, J. S., Reinecke, R., Zamrsky, D., Wagener, T., Taylor, R. G., Konar, M., Vargas, C. R., Porkka, M., Wang-Erlandsson, L., de Graaf, I., Cuthbert, M., Lindersson, S., Wada, Y., Bierkens, M. F. P., Pokhrel, Y., Rocha, J., Baldassarre, G. D., Kummu, M., Ferguson, G., Mukherjee, A., Lo, M. H., Scanlon, B. R., Johnson, M. S., and Zheng, C. M.: A review of open data for studying global groundwater in social-ecological systems, Environ. Res. Lett., 20, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/adf127, 2025.
Hugonnet, R., McNabb, R., Berthier, E., Menounos, B., Nuth, C., Girod, L., Farinotti, D., Huss, M., Dussaillant, I., Brun, F., and Kääb, A.: Accelerated global glacier mass loss in the early twenty-first century, Nature, 592, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03436-z, 2021.
IGRAC: The Global Groundwater Monitoring Network (GGMN), IGRAC [data set], https://doi.org/10.58154/6Z0Y-DA34, 2025.
Jäggi, A., Weigelt, M., Flechtner, F., Güntner, A., Mayer-Gurr, T., Martinis, S., Bruinsma, S., Flury, J., Bourgogne, S., Steffen, H., Meyer, U., Jean, Y., Susnik, A., Grahsl, A., Arnold, D., Cann-Guthauser, K., Dach, R., Li, Z., Chen, Q., van Dam, T., Gruber, C., Poropat, L., Gouweleeuw, B., Kvas, A., Klinger, B., Lemoine, J. M., Biancale, R., Zwenzner, H., Bandikova, T., and Shabanloui, A.: European Gravity Service for Improved Emergency Management (EGSIEM)-from concept to implementation, Geophys. J. Int., 218, 1572–1590, https://doi.org/10.1093/gji/ggz238, 2019.
Jäggi, A., Meyer, U., Lasser, M., Jenny, B., Lopez, T., Flechtner, F., Dahle, C., Förste, C., Mayer-Gürr, T., Kvas, A., Lemoine, J.-M., Bourgogne, S., Weigelt, M., and Groh, A.: International Combination Service for Time-Variable Gravity Fields (COST-G), in: International Association of Geodesy Symposia, edited by: Freymueller, J. T., and Sánchez, L., Springer International Publishing, Cham, 57–65, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-29507-2, 2023.
Jasechko, S., Seybold, H., Perrone, D., Fan, Y., Shamsudduha, M., Taylor, R. G., Fallatah, O., and Kirchner, J. W.: Rapid groundwater decline and some cases of recovery in aquifers globally, Nature, 625, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06879-8, 2024.
Jekeli, C.: Alternative Methods to Smooth the Earth's Gravity Field, The Ohio State University, Ohio, 327 pp., https://earthsciences.osu.edu/sites/earthsciences.osu.edu/files/report-327.pdf (last access: 1 September 2026), 1981.
Joly, D., Brossard, T., Cardot, H., Cavailhes, J., Hilal, M., and Wavresky, P.: Les types de climats en France, une construction spatiale, Cybergeo Eur. J. Geogr., https://doi.org/10.4000/cybergeo.23155, 2010.
Karandish, F., Liu, S. D., and de Graaf, I.: Global groundwater sustainability: A critical review of strategies and future pathways, J. Hydrol., 657, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2025.133060, 2025.
Kashani, A. and Safavi, H. R.: Assessing groundwater drought in Iran using GRACE data and machine learning, Sci. Rep., 15, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-99342-9, 2025.
Kitambo, B. M., Wongchuig, S., Tshimanga, R. M., Paris, A., Blazquez, A., Moreira, D., Frappart, F., Fleischmann, A. S., Kileshye, J. M. O., Tourian, M. J., and Papa, F.: Hydrogeological control of groundwater variations in the Congo River Basin revealed by GRACE water storage change decomposition, J. Hydrol.-Regional Studies, 62, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrh.2025.102810, 2025.
Kuang, X. X., Liu, J. G., Scanlon, B. R., Jiao, J. J., Jasechko, S., Lancia, M., Biskaborn, B. K., Wada, Y., Li, H. L., Zeng, Z. Z., Guo, Z. L., Yao, Y. Y., Gleeson, T., Nicot, J. P., Luo, X., Zou, Y. G., and Zheng, C. M.: The changing nature of groundwater in the global water cycle, Science, 383, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adf0630, 2024.
Lamarche, C., Santoro, M., Bontemps, S., d'Andrimont, R., Radoux, J., Giustarini, L., Brockmann, C., Wevers, J., Defourny, P., and Arino, O.: Compilation and Validation of SAR and Optical Data Products for a Complete and Global Map of Inland/Ocean Water Tailored to the Climate Modeling Community, Remote Sens., 9, https://doi.org/10.3390/rs9010036, 2017.
Landerer, F. W. and Swenson, S. C.: Accuracy of scaled GRACE terrestrial water storage estimates, Water Resour. Res., 48, https://doi.org/10.1029/2011wr011453, 2012.
Landerer, F. W., Flechtner, F. M., Save, H., Webb, F. H., Bandikova, T., Bertiger, W. I., Bettadpur, S. V., Byun, S. H., Dahle, C., Dobslaw, H., Fahnestock, E., Harvey, N., Kang, Z. G., Kruizinga, G. L. H., Loomis, B. D., McCullough, C., Murbock, M., Nagel, P., Paik, M., Pie, N., Poole, S., Strekalov, D., Tamisiea, M. E., Wang, F. R., Watkins, M. M., Wen, H. Y., Wiese, D. N., and Yuan, D. N.: Extending the Global Mass Change Data Record: GRACE Follow-On Instrument and Science Data Performance, Geophys. Res. Lett., 47, https://doi.org/10.1029/2020gl088306, 2020.
Lasser, M.: Noise Modelling for GRACE Follow-On Observables in the Celestial Mechanics Approach, Geodätisch-geophysikalische Arbeiten in der Schweiz, Schweizerische Geodätische Kommission, Vol. 110, ISBN 978-3-908440-57-4, 2023.
Lehner, B. and Döll, P.: Development and validation of a global database of lakes, reservoirs and wetlands, J. Hydrol., 296, 1–22, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2004.03.028, 2004.
Li, B. L., Rodell, M., Kumar, S., Beaudoing, H. K., Getirana, A., Zaitchik, B. F., de Goncalves, L. G., Cossetin, C., Bhanja, S., Mukherjee, A., Tian, S. Y., Tangdamrongsub, N., Long, D., Nanteza, J., Lee, J., Policelli, F., Goni, I. B., Daira, D., Bila, M., de Lannoy, G., Mocko, D., Steele-Dunne, S. C., Save, H., and Bettadpur, S.: Global GRACE Data Assimilation for Groundwater and Drought Monitoring: Advances and Challenges, Water Resour. Res., 55, 7564–7586, https://doi.org/10.1029/2018wr024618, 2019.
Lievens, H., Demuzere, M., Marshall, H. P., Reichle, R. H., Brucker, L., Brangers, I., de Rosnay, P., Dumont, M., Girotto, M., Immerzeel, W. W., Jonas, T., Kim, E. J., Koch, I., Marty, C., Saloranta, T., Schöber, J., and De Lannoy, G. J. M.: Snow depth variability in the Northern Hemisphere mountains observed from space, Nat. Commun., 10, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-12566-y, 2019.
Lin, Y. L. and Song, C. Q.: Monitoring surface water in floodplains by satellites: Progress, challenges, and perspectives, J. Hydrol., 664, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2025.134458, 2026.
Lischeid, G., Dannowski, R., Kaiser, K., Nützmann, G., Steidl, J., and Stüve, P.: Inconsistent hydrological trends do not necessarily imply spatially heterogeneous drivers, J. Hydrol., 596, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2021.126096, 2021.
Long, D., Longuevergne, L., and Scanlon, B. R.: Global analysis of approaches for deriving total water storage changes from GRACE satellites, Water Resour. Res., 51, 2574–2594, https://doi.org/10.1002/2014wr016853, 2015.
Long, D., Xu, Y., Cui, Y., Cui, Y., Butler, J. J., Dong, L., Wang, L., Liu, D., Wada, Y., Hu, L., Bai, G., Li, B., Wang, S., Nong, X., Cai, Y., Cheng, C., Mu, Y., Qiao, Y., Wang, J., Wang, H., and Scanlon, B. R.: Unprecedented large-scale aquifer recovery through human intervention, Nat. Commun., 16, 7296, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-62719-5, 2025.
Luojus, K., Pulliainen, J., Takala, M., Lemmetyinen, J., Mortimer, C., Derksen, C., Mudryk, L., Moisander, M., Hiltunen, M., Smolander, T., Ikonen, J., Cohen, J., Salminen, M., Norberg, J., Veijola, K., and Venäläinen, P.: GlobSnow v3.0 Northern Hemisphere snow water equivalent dataset, Scientific Data, 8, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-021-00939-2, 2021.
Maréchal, J.-C. and Rouillard, J.: Groundwater in France: Resources, Use and Management Issues, in: Sustainable Groundwater Management: A Comparative Analysis of French and Australian Policies and Implications to Other Countries, Global Issues in Water Policy, edited by: Rinaudo, J.-D., Holley, C., Barnett, S., and Montginoul, M., Springer International Publishing, Cham, 17–45, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32766-8_2, 2020.
Martens, B., Miralles, D. G., Lievens, H., van der Schalie, R., de Jeu, R. A. M., Fernández-Prieto, D., Beck, H. E., Dorigo, W. A., and Verhoest, N. E. C.: GLEAM v3: satellite-based land evaporation and root-zone soil moisture, Geosci. Model Dev., 10, 1903–1925, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-10-1903-2017, 2017.
Mehrnegar, N., Jones, O., Singer, M. B., Schumacher, M., Jagdhuber, T., Scanlon, B. R., Rateb, A., and Forootan, E.: Exploring groundwater and soil water storage changes across the CONUS at 12.5 km resolution by a Bayesian integration of GRACE data into W3RA, Sci. Total Environ., 758, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.143579, 2021.
Meyer, U., Lasser, M., Dahle, C., Förste, C., Behzadpour, S., Koch, and Jäggi, A.: Combined monthly GRACE-FO gravity fields for a Global Gravity-based Groundwater Product, Geophys. J. Int., 236, 456–469, https://doi.org/10.1093/gji/ggad437, 2023.
Mishra, V., Ellenburg, W. L., Markert, K. N., and Limaye, A. S.: Performance evaluation of soil moisture profile estimation through entropy-based and exponential filter models, Hydrolog. Sci. J., 65, 1036–1048, https://doi.org/10.1080/02626667.2020.1730846, 2020.
Muñoz-Sabater, J., Dutra, E., Agustí-Panareda, A., Albergel, C., Arduini, G., Balsamo, G., Boussetta, S., Choulga, M., Harrigan, S., Hersbach, H., Martens, B., Miralles, D. G., Piles, M., Rodríguez-Fernández, N. J., Zsoter, E., Buontempo, C., and Thépaut, J.-N.: ERA5-Land: a state-of-the-art global reanalysis dataset for land applications, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 13, 4349–4383, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-13-4349-2021, 2021.
Müller Schmied, H., Cáceres, D., Eisner, S., Flörke, M., Herbert, C., Niemann, C., Peiris, T. A., Popat, E., Portmann, F. T., Reinecke, R., Schumacher, M., Shadkam, S., Telteu, C.-E., Trautmann, T., and Döll, P.: The global water resources and use model WaterGAP v2.2d: model description and evaluation, Geosci. Model Dev., 14, 1037–1079, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-1037-2021, 2021.
Opie, S., Taylor, R. G., Brierley, C. M., Shamsudduha, M., and Cuthbert, M. O.: Climate–groundwater dynamics inferred from GRACE and the role of hydraulic memory, Earth Syst. Dynam., 11, 775–791, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-11-775-2020, 2020.
Papa, F. and Frappart, F.: Surface Water Storage in Rivers and Wetlands Derived from Satellite Observations: A Review of Current Advances and Future Opportunities for Hydrological Sciences, Remote Sens., 13, https://doi.org/10.3390/rs13204162, 2021.
Pasik, A., Gruber, A., Preimesberger, W., De Santis, D., and Dorigo, W.: Uncertainty estimation for a new exponential-filter-based long-term root-zone soil moisture dataset from Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) surface observations, Geosci. Model Dev., 16, 4957–4976, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-4957-2023, 2023.
Paulik, C., Dorigo, W., Wagner, W., and Kidd, R.: Validation of the ASCAT Soil Water Index using in situ data from the International Soil Moisture Network, Int. J. Appl. Earth Obs., 30, 1–8, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jag.2014.01.007, 2014.
Peltier, W. R., Argus, D. F., and Drummond, R.: Comment on “An Assessment of the ICE-6G_C (VM5a) Glacial Isostatic Adjustment Model” by Purcell et al, J. Geophys. Res.-Sol. Ea., 123, 2019–2028, https://doi.org/10.1002/2016jb013844, 2018.
Preimesberger, W., Stradiotti, P., and Dorigo, W.: ESA CCI Soil Moisture GAPFILLED: an independent global gap-free satellite climate data record with uncertainty estimates, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 17, 4305–4329, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-17-4305-2025, 2025.
Pulliainen, J.: Mapping of snow water equivalent and snow depth in boreal and sub-arctic zones by assimilating space-borne microwave radiometer data and ground-based observations, Remote Sens. Environ., 101, 257–269, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2006.01.002, 2006.
Pulliainen, J., Luojus, K., Derksen, C., Mudryk, L., Lemmetyinen, J., Salminen, M., Ikonen, J., Takala, M., Cohen, J., Smolander, T., and Norberg, J.: Patterns and trends of Northern Hemisphere snow mass from 1980 to 2018, Nature, 581, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2258-0, 2020.
Rateb, A., Scanlon, B. R., Pool, D. R., Sun, A., Zhang, Z. Z., Chen, J. L., Clark, B., Faunt, C. C., Haugh, C. J., Hill, M., Hobza, C., McGuire, V. L., Reitz, M., Schmied, H. M., Sutanudjaja, E. H., Swenson, S., Wiese, D., Xia, Y. L., and Zell, W.: Comparison of Groundwater Storage Changes From GRACE Satellites With Monitoring and Modeling of Major US Aquifers, Water Resour. Res., 56, https://doi.org/10.1029/2020wr027556, 2020.
RGI: The Randolph Glacier Inventory, RGI [data set], https://doi.org/10.7265/N5-RGI-60, 2017.
Rzepecka, Z., Birylo, M., Jarsjö, J., Cao, F. F., and Pietron, J.: Groundwater Storage Variations across Climate Zones from Southern Poland to Arctic Sweden: Comparing GRACE-GLDAS Models with Well Data, Remote Sens., 16, https://doi.org/10.3390/rs16122104, 2024.
Saccò, M., Mammola, S., Altermatt, F., Alther, R., Bolpagni, R., Brancelj, A., Brankovits, D., Fiser, C., Gerovasileiou, V., Griebler, C., Guareschi, S., Hose, G. C., Korbel, K., Lictevout, E., Malard, F., Martínez, A., Niemiller, M. L., Robertson, A., Tanalgo, K. C., Bichuette, M. E., Borko, S., Brad, T., Campbell, M. A., Cardoso, P., Celico, F., Cooper, S. J. B., Culver, D., Di Lorenzo, T., Galassi, D. M. P., Guzik, M. T., Hartland, A., Humphreys, W. F., Ferreira, R. L., Lunghi, E., Nizzoli, D., Perina, G., Raghavan, R., Richards, Z., Reboleira, A., Rohde, M. M., Fernández, D. S., Schmidt, S. I., van der Heyde, M., Weaver, L., White, N. E., Zagmajster, M., Hogg, I., Ruhi, A., Gagnon, M. M., Allentoft, M. E., and Reinecke, R.: Groundwater is a hidden global keystone ecosystem, Glob. Change Biol., 30, https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.17066, 2024.
Sayer, A. M., Govaerts, Y., Kolmonen, P., Lipponen, A., Luffarelli, M., Mielonen, T., Patadia, F., Popp, T., Povey, A. C., Stebel, K., and Witek, M. L.: A review and framework for the evaluation of pixel-level uncertainty estimates in satellite aerosol remote sensing, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 13, 373–404, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-13-373-2020, 2020.
Sayyadi, S., Nguyen, V. D., Apel, H., Haas, J., Dang, T. T., Than, V. D., Nguyen, N. H., and Güntner, A.: Observation-based analysis of groundwater storage in Vietnam's Central Highlands: influence of hydro-climatic variability, Hydrolog. Sci. J., https://doi.org/10.1080/02626667.2025.2568558, 2025.
Scanlon, B. R., Fakhreddine, S., Rateb, A., de Graaf, I., Famiglietti, J., Gleeson, T., Grafton, R. Q., Jobbagy, E., Kebede, S., Kolusu, S. R., Konikow, L. F., Long, D., Mekonnen, M., Schmied, H. M., Mukherjee, A., MacDonald, A., Reedy, R. C., Shamsudduha, M., Simmons, C. T., Sun, A. L., Taylor, R. G., Villholth, K. G., Vörösmarty, C., and Zheng, C. M.: Global water resources and the role of groundwater in a resilient water future, Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, 4, 87–101, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43017-022-00378-6, 2023.
Schwatke, C., Dettmering, D., Bosch, W., and Seitz, F.: DAHITI – an innovative approach for estimating water level time series over inland waters using multi-mission satellite altimetry, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 4345–4364, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-4345-2015, 2015.
Shamsudduha, M. and Taylor, R. G.: Groundwater storage dynamics in the world's large aquifer systems from GRACE: uncertainty and role of extreme precipitation, Earth Syst. Dynam., 11, 755–774, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-11-755-2020, 2020.
Shangguan, Y. L., Min, X. X., and Shi, Z.: Gap Filling of the ESA CCI Soil Moisture Data Using a Spatiotemporal Attention-Based Residual Deep Network, IEEE J. Sel. Top. Appl., 16, 5344–5354, https://doi.org/10.1109/jstars.2023.3284841, 2023.
Sharifi, E., Haas, J., Boergens, E., and Güntner, A.: Global Multi-Resolution Land Fraction and Land–Ocean Masks Derived from ESA CCI Water Bodies v4.0 (Version 1.0), GFZ Data Services [data set], https://doi.org/10.5880/G3P.2025.001, 2025a.
Sharifi, E., Haas, J., Boergens, E., Dobslaw, H., and Güntner, A.: Technical note: GRACE-compatible filtering of water storage data sets via spatial autocorrelation analysis, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 6985–6998, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6985-2025, 2025b.
Shihora, L., Balidakis, K., Dill, R., Dahle, C., Ghobadi-Far, K., Bonin, J., and Dobslaw, H.: Non-Tidal Background Modeling for Satellite Gravimetry Based on Operational ECWMF and ERA5 Reanalysis Data: AOD1B RL07, J. Geophys. Res.-Sol. Ea., 127, https://doi.org/10.1029/2022jb024360, 2022.
Sindico, F., Hirata, R., and Manganelli, A.: The Guarani Aquifer System: From a Beacon of hope to a question mark in the governance of transboundary aquifers, J. Hydrol.-Regional Studies, 20, 49–59, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrh.2018.04.008, 2018.
Springer, A., Lopez, T., Owor, M., Frappart, F., and Stieglitz, T.: The Role of Space-Based Observations for Groundwater Resource Monitoring over Africa, Surv. Geophys., 44, 123–172, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10712-022-09759-4, 2023.
Strassberg, G., Scanlon, B. R., and Rodell, M.: Comparison of seasonal terrestrial water storage variations from GRACE with groundwater-level measurements from the High Plains Aquifer (USA), Geophys. Res. Lett., 34, L14402, https://doi.org/10.1029/2007GL030139, 2007.
Strassberg, G., Scanlon, B. R., and Chambers, D.: Evaluation of groundwater storage monitoring with the GRACE satellite: Case study of the High Plains aquifer, central United States, Water Resour. Res., 45, W05410, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008wr006892, 2009.
Swenson, S., Chambers, D., and Wahr, J.: Estimating geocenter variations from a combination of GRACE and ocean model output, J. Geophys. Res.-Sol. Ea., 113, https://doi.org/10.1029/2007jb005338, 2008.
Takala, M., Luojus, K., Pulliainen, J., Derksen, C., Lemmetyinen, J., Kärnä, J. P., Koskinen, J., and Bojkov, B.: Estimating northern hemisphere snow water equivalent for climate research through assimilation of space-borne radiometer data and ground-based measurements, Remote Sens. Environ., 115, 3517–3529, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2011.08.014, 2011.
Tapley, B. D.: Fundamentals of orbit determination, in: Theory of Satellite Geodesy and Gravity Field Determination, edited by: Sanso, F., and Rummel, R., Springer Lecture Notes in Earth Sciences, Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, 235–260, ISBN 978-3-540-51528-9, 1989.
Tapley, B. D., Bettadpur, S. V., Ries, J. C., Thompson, P. F., and Watkins, M. M.: GRACE measurements of mass variability in the Earth system, Science, 305, 503–505, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1099192, 2004.
Taylor, R. G., Scanlon, B., Doll, P., Rodell, M., van Beek, R., Wada, Y., Longuevergne, L., Leblanc, M., Famiglietti, J. S., Edmunds, M., Konikow, L., Green, T. R., Chen, J. Y., Taniguchi, M., Bierkens, M. F. P., MacDonald, A., Fan, Y., Maxwell, R. M., Yechieli, Y., Gurdak, J. J., Allen, D. M., Shamsudduha, M., Hiscock, K., Yeh, P. J. F., Holman, I., and Treidel, H.: Ground water and climate change, Nat. Clim. Change, 3, 322–329, https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1744, 2013.
The GlaMBIE Team: Community estimate of global glacier mass changes from 2000 to 2023, Nature, 639, 382–388, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-08545-z, 2025.
Tsypin, M., Cacace, M., Guse, B., Lischeid, G., Güntner, A., and Scheck-Wenderoth, M.: Damped groundwater response to recharge: From spectral analysis to regional modeling, J. Hydrol., 658, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2025.133193, 2025.
Van der Knijff, J. M., Younis, J., and De Roo, A. P. J.: LISFLOOD: a GIS-based distributed model for river basin scale water balance and flood simulation, Int. J. Geogr. Inf. Sci., 24, 189–212, https://doi.org/10.1080/13658810802549154, 2010.
van Dijk, A. I. J. M., Renzullo, L. J., Wada, Y., and Tregoning, P.: A global water cycle reanalysis (2003–2012) merging satellite gravimetry and altimetry observations with a hydrological multi-model ensemble, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 18, 2955–2973, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-18-2955-2014, 2014.
Venäläinen, P., Luojus, K., Lemmetyinen, J., Pulliainen, J., Moisander, M., and Takala, M.: Impact of dynamic snow density on GlobSnow snow water equivalent retrieval accuracy, The Cryosphere, 15, 2969–2981, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-15-2969-2021, 2021.
Vreugdenhil, M., Greimeister-Pfeil, I., Preimesberger, W., Camici, S., Dorigo, W., Enenkel, M., van der Schalie, R., Steele-Dunne, S., and Wagner, W.: Microwave remote sensing for agricultural drought monitoring: Recent developments and challenges, Frontiers in Water, 4, https://doi.org/10.3389/frwa.2022.1045451, 2022.
Wang, T. J., Franz, T. E., You, J. S., Shulski, M. D., and Ray, C.: Evaluating controls of soil properties and climatic conditions on the use of an exponential filter for converting near surface to root zone soil moisture contents, J. Hydrol., 548, 683–696, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2017.03.055, 2017.
Weise, K., Höfer, R., Franke, J., Guelmami, A., Simonson, W., Muro, J., O'Connor, B., Strauch, A., Flink, S., Eberle, J., Mino, E., Thulin, S., Philipson, P., van Valkengoed, E., Truckenbrodt, J., Zanderg, F., Sánchez, A., Schröder, C., Thonfeld, F., Fitoka, E., Scott, E., Ling, M., Schwarz, M., Kunz, I., Thümer, G., Plasmeijer, A., and Hilarides, L.: Wetland extent tools for SDG 6.6.1 reporting from the Satellite-based Wetland Observation Service (SWOS), Remote Sens. Environ., 247, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2020.111892, 2020.
Wendland, E. C., Rabelo, J. L., and Roehrig, J.: Guarani Aquifer System – The Strategical Water Source In South America, Institut für Tropentechnologie, https://isarm-americas.org/files/Bibliografia%20Guarani/Bibliografia%20Guarani/Catalogados/ittpub302101_21.pdf (last access: 23 October 2026), 2006.
WGMS: Fluctuations of Glaciers (FoG) Database, WGMS [data set], https://doi.org/10.5904/wgms-fog-2025-02b, 2023.
WMO: The 2022 GCOS Implementation Plan (GCOS-244), World Meteorological Organization (WMO); United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP); International Science Council (ISC); Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (IOC-UNESCO), Geneva, https://library.wmo.int/doc_num.php?explnum_id=11317 (last access: 3 October 2026), 2022.
Wouters, B., Gardner, A. S., and Moholdt, G.: Global Glacier Mass Loss During the GRACE Satellite Mission (2002–2016), Front. Earth Sci., 7, https://doi.org/10.3389/feart.2019.00096, 2019.
Xu, L., Ferris, D., Huggins, X., Wong, J. S., Mohan, C., Sadri, S., Chandanpurkar, H. A., Sanyal, P., and Famiglietti, J. S.: From coarse resolution to practical solution: GRACE as a science communication and policymaking tool for sustainable groundwater management, J. Hydrol., 623, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2023.129845, 2023.
Yao, F. F., Livneh, B., Rajagopalan, B., Wang, J. D., Crétaux, J. F., Wada, Y., and Berge-Nguyen, M.: Satellites reveal widespread decline in global lake water storage, Science, 380, 743–749, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abo2812, 2023.
Zemp, M. and Welty, E.: Temporal downscaling of glaciological mass balance using seasonal observations, J. Glaciol., https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2023.66, 2023.
Zemp, M., Huss, M., Thibert, E., Eckert, N., McNabb, R., Huber, J., Barandun, M., Machguth, H., Nussbaumer, S. U., Gartner-Roer, I., Thomson, L., Paul, F., Maussion, F., Kutuzov, S., and Cogley, J. G.: Global glacier mass changes and their contributions to sea-level rise from 1961 to 2016, Nature, 568, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1071-0, 2019.
Zemp, M., Huss, M., Eckert, N., Thibert, E., Paul, F., Nussbaumer, S. U., and Gärtner-Roer, I.: Brief communication: Ad hoc estimation of glacier contributions to sea-level rise from the latest glaciological observations, The Cryosphere, 14, 1043–1050, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-14-1043-2020, 2020.
Zemp, M., Jakob, L., Brun, F., and Sutterley, T.: Glacier monitoring from space is crucial, and at risk, EOS, 106, https://doi.org/10.1029/2025EO250290, 2025.
Zhang, J., Liesch, T., and Goldscheider, N.: Impacts of climate change and human activities on global groundwater storage from 2003 to 2022, J. Hydrol., 664, 134298, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2025.134298, 2026.
Short summary
We provide a data set that illustrates how the amount of water that is stored in the subsurface as groundwater varies in time over the continents of the Earth. An important part of the data comes from satellites that track changes in water by its gravity effect. The data allow for assessing how groundwater as the most important freshwater resource for mankind and ecosystems is affected by climate variability, climate change and withdrawal by human activities.
We provide a data set that illustrates how the amount of water that is stored in the subsurface...
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint