Relative drifts and stability of satellite and ground-based stratospheric ozone profiles at NDACC lidar stations

Abstract. The long-term evolution of stratospheric ozone at different stations in the low and mid-latitudes is investigated. The analysis is performed by comparing the collocated profiles of ozone lidars, at the northern mid-latitudes (Meteorological Observatory Hohenpeißenberg, Haute-Provence Observatory, Tsukuba and Table Mountain Facility), tropics (Mauna Loa Observatory) and southern mid-latitudes (Lauder), with ozonesondes and space-borne sensors (SBUV(/2), SAGE II, HALOE, UARS MLS and Aura MLS), extracted around the stations. Relative differences are calculated to find biases and temporal drifts in the measurements. All measurement techniques show their best agreement with respect to the lidar at 20–40 km, where the differences and drifts are generally within ±5% and ±0.5% yr⁻¹, respectively, at most stations. In addition, the stability of the long-term ozone observations (lidar, SBUV(/2), SAGE II and HALOE) is evaluated by the cross-comparison of each data set. In general, all lidars and SBUV(/2) exhibit near-zero drifts and the comparison between SAGE II and HALOE shows larger, but insignificant drifts. The RMS of the drifts of lidar and SBUV(/2) is 0.22 and 0.27% yr⁻¹, respectively at 20–40 km. The average drifts of the long-term data sets, derived from various comparisons, are less than ±0.3% yr⁻¹ in the 20–40 km altitude at all stations. A combined time series of the relative differences between SAGE II, HALOE and Aura MLS with respect to lidar data at six sites is constructed, to obtain long-term data sets lasting up to 27 years. The relative drifts derived from these combined data are very small, within ±0.2% yr⁻¹.