GRACE Mission Success Criteria

1

• GRACE Mission Success Criteria
• Requirements
• One year operation of two satellites and the
  High Accuracy Intersatellite
  Ranging System (HAIRS)
• Ten times improvement in the knowledge of the
  mean gravity field
• Uniform gravity field solution with resolution of
  400 km wavelength
• Cumulative geoid height RMS error lt 1 cm at 600
  km
• Documented in the Level 1 Requirements for
  theGravity Recovery and Climate Experiment
  (GRACE) Mission, October 15,2001 to Code Y

2

• GRACE Baseline Science Mission Criteria
• Primary goal
• Accurate global high-resolution models of the
  static and time variable components of
  the Earths gravity field
• Sequence of approximately monthly estimates of
  the global gravity field
• Time history of its temporal variability
• Period of up to 5 years
•  
• Measurement Requirement 
• Cumulative geoid height error RMS lt 400 microns
  for n 70(Wavelength of 570 and greater)
• This will improve the knowledge of the gravity
  field model by a factor of 1000 up to n
  40( wavelengths of 1000 km)
•  
• Documented in the Mission Definition and
  Requirements Agreement, August 1, 2001 under
  contract to NASA/GSFC
• Documented in Level 1 Requirements for the
  Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE)
  Mission, October 15, 2001 to Code Y