About

Ozone is strongly linked to climate due to its influence on Earth’s radiative budget, absorbing solar UV radiation in the stratosphere and terrestrial infrared radiation in the troposphere. Due to these dual processes, the climate impact of changes in ozone concentrations varies with the altitude.

Human-produced chlorine and bromine-containing gases are responsible for major ozone losses in the lower atmosphere resulting in a cooling effect on the Earth's surface. In contrast, increases in tropospheric ozone, a result of air pollution, have a warming effect on the Earth's surface, thereby contributing to the greenhouse effect.

The Ozone project has been part of the ESA Climate Change Initiative (CCI) programme since it was initiated in early 2010. This project focuses on the generation of multi-decadal time series of harmonised and consistent ozone data suitable to assess long-term changes in the total ozone column, the tropospheric ozone column as well as its vertical distribution across the UT/LS and stratosphere.

Ozone_CCI climate data records are based on satellite nadir sensors such as GOME, SCIAMACHY, GOME-2, IASI, OMI and TROPOMI complemented by a series of limb-viewing instruments allowing for a comprehensive characterization of the ozone columns and vertical profiles at various horizontal scales. These data products are freely distributed to the international user community and several of these feed the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S).

Main activities include

Objective

The Ozone CCI project’s objectives are: