GOME-2 -- the ozone instrument onboard the European METOP satellites

Since 1995 the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME) is measuring ozone (total column and profile), nitrogen dioxide and other minor trace gases on-board of the European Space Agency (ESA) ERS-2 satellite. The European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) and ESA decided to fly an advanced GOME-2 instrument on the METOP satellites. Within the EUMETSAT Polar System (EPS), the GOME-2 measurements will provide the input for the ozone data record in the timeframe 2005 to 2020. The radiometric calibration of the polarisation sensitive GOME-2 instrument is significantly improved by the simultaneous measurement of s- and p-polarised light at moderate resolution and high temporal resolution. The Polarisation Monitoring Unit (PU) measures the spectral range between 312 and 790 nm in 15 narrow bands. The ground pixel size in the 960 km swath is 40 * 5km2. The paper describes in detail the polarization measurement devices and their technical capabilities.