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Opportunities for Gravity and GNSS Surveying to Monitor Changes in the Terrestrial Water Storage in the Congo River Basin

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Abstract

Monitoring terrestrial water storage (TWS) is critical for global hydrological cycles and important to sustain diverse sectors, such as agriculture, manufacturing, and other industries in many countries. Yet, we have very little knowledge of the spatiotemporal dynamics of TWS changes in the Congo River, which is the world’s second largest river in size (~3.7 million km2), and its discharge is second only to that of the Amazon River (~40,600 m3s−1). Temporal variations in the Earth’s gravitational field likely could be attributed mainly to changes in the TWS in tropical basins. Therefore, the changes in TWS can be monitored based on the Earth’s gravitational field. Although using the Global Navigational Satellite System (GNSS) to measure the gravitational field is prevalent in many regions, this approach has not been considered in the Congo Basin, which is a void. In this paper, we have outlined why it has been suggested to initiate GNSS surveying for monitoring the changes in the TWS in the Congo Basin.

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Data Availability

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

Station data were obtained from the IGS data centers (https://igs.org/network/). The figure was prepared using the QGIS Desktop 3.4.15 software. Anonymous reviewers, the editor of this manuscript, and Dr. Hyongki Lee have provided valuable inputs that improved the quality of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Terrain Analysis and Survey, Ground Operations Command, Republic of Korea Army, Yongin, 17046, South Korea

    Donghwan Kim

  2. Now at Dronebot Force Branch, Republic of Korea Army Headquarters, Gyeryong, 32801, South Korea

    Donghwan Kim

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Correspondence to Donghwan Kim.

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Kim, D. Opportunities for Gravity and GNSS Surveying to Monitor Changes in the Terrestrial Water Storage in the Congo River Basin. Remote Sens Earth Syst Sci 4, 121–124 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41976-021-00049-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41976-021-00049-y

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