The accuracy of digital elevation models of the Antarctic continent

The accuracy of two widely used digital elevation models of Antarctica was assessed using data from the Geoscience Laser Altimeter System onboard ICESat. The digital elevation models were derived from satellite radar altimeter and terrestrial data sets. The first, termed JLB97, was produced predominantly from ERS-1 data while the second, termed, RAMPv2 included other sources of data in areas of high relief and poor coverage by ERS-1. The accuracy of the models was examined as a function of surface slope and original data source. Large errors, in excess of 100 m, were ubiquitous in both models in areas where terrestrially-derived elevation data had been used but were more extensive in RAMPv2. Elsewhere, the systematic error (bias) was found to be a monotonic function of slope for JLB97, with a more complex, less predictable bias for RAMPv2. The magnitude of the global, slope-dependent, bias ranged from less than a metre to slightly over 10 m but with much larger regional deviations. The random error ranged from about 1 m to over 100 m depending on the DEM and slope. The random error was consistently over a factor two larger for RAMPv2 compared to JLB97.