Vegetation Water Content Estimation Using GNSS Measurements

Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) opportunity signals reflected at or near the Earth´s surface have already shown their potential to perform retrievals of a number of geophysical parameters. Radio occultations using GNSS signals are also used for atmospheric sensing. This letter presents a GNSS technique to retrieve vegetation water content (VWC). This technique measures the received powers of the GPS signals in open sky and under the vegetation layer. From these two powers, the attenuation due to the vegetation is computed, which is related to the VWC. This letter presents the results obtained after deploying the instrument in a walnut-tree stand for 11 months.