Overview

Here I provide access to public material related to past and current research projects. The projects are intended to improve the models describing the changes in Earth's shape, gravity field and rotation induced by surface loads. Currently, the list of projects includes:

• Towards a standard model of present-day signals due to post-glacial rebound: This is a project carried out in the frame of the Special Bureau for Loading. A Call for Submission of predictions of the present-day post-glacial rebound signal (PGS) in geodetic quantities was issued by the SBL in February 2005. In response, the SBL received a number of submission which the authors agreed to make freely available through the SBL web pages. I am currently in the process of intercomparing these predictions as well as comparing them to geodetic observations. The model predictions were available at the former PGS Project page. The intercomparisons are available at my page.
  
  
• A Global Integrated Model of Surface Loads on the Earth (AGILE): The goal of this project was to set up a comprehensive model of surface loads, including atmosphere, ocean, terrestrial hydrosphere, cryosphere as well as man-made loads such reservoirs and de-loading due to mining and oil and ground water extraction. The project aims at a high spatial and temporal resolution for the last 20 years, medium resolution for the last 50 years and even less for the last 100 years. Currently, this project is in the early phase of defining the data description language for the load models. More information is available at the AGILE page.
  
  
• A proposal for the treatment of atmospheric loading in space-geodetic analysis: The IERS Conventions currently do not contain a clear recommendation of how to account for atmospheric loading in the determination of the ITRF as well as in the computation of products giving access to the ITRF. A key question is whether for daily or weekly analyses, the loading should be included at the observation level or whether the inclusion in the reference frame alignment of the solution is sufficient. The answer to this question depends on the statistical properties of the load. Therefore, the statistical properties of the atmospheric load are currently studied on the basis of the ERA40 dataset. The ultimate goal of the project is to provide a detailed and easily applicable algorithm for the inclusion of atmospheric loading in the Conventions (see the project page "Atmospheric loading in IERS Conventions)".
  
  
• Local sea level changes: Local Sea Level (LSL) changes are expected to be one of the major impact of climate change. Understanding the forcing of coastal LSL variations and developing the capability to provide predictions of future LSL changes is therefore of vital interest for mitigation of climate change impacts and the planning of coastal protection. Presentations related to this issue are available at the project page.