Snow Depth Estimation Based on Combination of Pseudorange and Carrier Phase of GNSS Dual-Frequency Signals

Global navigation satellite system reflectometry (GNSS-R) is a new remote sensing technique, which can be used to measure a wide range of geophysical parameters. GNSS-R makes use of the simultaneous reception of the direct transmission and the coherent surface reflections of the GNSS signal with either a single antenna or multiple separate antennas. This paper presents a new snow depth estimation method using a combination of pseudorange and carrier phase of GNSS dual-frequency signals. The proposed method is geometry-free and is not affected by ionospheric delays. The formulas of the amplitude attenuation factor of reflected signals, multipath-induced carrier-phase error, and pesudorange error for ground-based GNSS receivers are used to describe the combined signals. Using theoretical formulas instead of in situ measurement data, analytical linear models are established in advance to describe the relationship between snow depth and main frequency of combined signal time series. When the main frequency of the combined measurements is obtained by spectrum analysis, the model is used to determine snow depth. Two experimental data sets recorded in two different environments were used to test the proposed method. The results demonstrate that there exists good agreement between the proposed method and the ground-truth measurements.

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