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Abstract

Since March 2002 the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, together with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and the German Space Agency (DLR), operates the twin satellite mission GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) and is part of the joint US-German Science Data System. Over GRACE‘s 15+ years of operation, researchers from GFZ and other national/ international institutions have developed innovative techniques to use the GRACE mass transport data set and to combine it with other observations and models for new insights into the Earth system. Highlights are the monitoring of changes in the hydrological cycle such as ground water depletion and related droughts, prognosis of floods in large river systems, the melting of Greenland’s and Antarctica’s ice sheets and large glacier systems, changes in the ocean dynamics and related sea level rise or observation of postseismic relaxation after large earthquakes. Currently, GFZ implements with JPL/NASA the successor mission GRACE-FO (Follow-on) which is due for launch in early 2018. The primary objective of GRACE-FO is to continue mass transport monitoring as only by long time series reliable conclusions on climate change can be drawn. The secondary objectives are to continue GRACE’s radio occultation measurements for provision to Numerical Weather Services and to demonstrate the improvement of the measurement of the inter-satellite separation by an innovative laser ranging interferometer. This is a necessary prerequisite to improve the spatial and temporal resolution by Next Generation Gravity Missions.