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Full catalog/GRACEFO_L2_GFZ_MONTHLY_0063
GRACEFO_L2_GFZ_MONTHLY_0063·v6.3·dataset

Monthly shifts in Earth's gravity from moving water (GRACE-FO, GFZ)

GRACE-FO Level-2 Monthly Geopotential Spherical Harmonics GFZ Release 6.3 (RL06.3)
deformation NASA POCLOUD Level 2 ASCII
In plain English

What it measures. Captures tiny month-to-month changes in Earth's gravity field, which mostly reflect water shifting around the planet, expressed in a specialized mathematical form.

How it's made. Derived from the twin GRACE-FO satellites measuring minute changes in the distance between them, processed by Germany's GFZ research center; the data team flags it as for expert use only.

How & where you'd use it. A specialist building block for tracking groundwater, ice sheets, and sea level; non-experts typically use the easier maps built from it rather than these raw coefficients.

What's measured

SOLID EARTH › GRAVITY/GRAVITATIONAL FIELD › GRAVITY

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2018-05-22 → ongoing
  • Measured byGRACE-FO (GRACE-FO MWI, GRACE-FO LRI, ACC, GRACE-FO SCA)
  • Processing levelLevel 2
  • Spatial extent-180, -89, 180, 89
  • FormatsASCII
  • StatusACTIVE

What you can do with it

  • Measure ground motion and subsidence (InSAR)
  • Track earthquakes, volcanoes and landslides
  • Map elevation and terrain change
Official description

FOR EXPERT USE ONLY. This dataset contains estimates of the total month-by-month geopotential of the Earth, derived from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-On (GRACE-FO) mission measurements, produced by the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ). The data are provided as spherical harmonic coefficients, averaged over approximately a month. These coefficients are derived from the Microwave Instrument (MWI) measured intersatellite range changes between the twin spacecraft of the GRACE-FO mission. Refer to the mission page for more information. This GRACE-FO RL06.3 data is an updated version of the GRACE-FO RL06.1 Level-2 data products. RL06.3 differs from RL06.1 only in the Level-1B accelerometer transplant data that is used for the GF2 satellite: Level-2 RL06.3 uses ACH1B RL04 that is contained within the ACX2 Level-1 bundle, which replaces ACH1B RL04 contained within the ACX Level-1 bundle that was used for Level-2 RL06.1 (note: ACX2-L1B is only applicable for 01/2023 onwards in wide-deadband operational mode; from 6/2018 through 12/2022, RL06.1 and RL06.3 GRACE-FO data are identical). All GRACE-FO RL06.3 Level-2 products are fully compatible with the GRACE RL06 level-2 fields. Refer to the mission page for more information.

Get the data

gracefo_l2_gfz_monthly_0063_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="GRACEFO_L2_GFZ_MONTHLY_0063",
    version="6.3",
    bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9),  # your area (W,S,E,N)
    temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"),       # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results)   # stream straight from POCLOUD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.