GCOS Reference Upper-Air Network (GRUAN)

GCOS is establishing a reference network for upper-air climate observations (GRUAN).

GRUAN is expected to provide long-term, highly accurate measurements of the atmospheric profile, complemented by ground-based state of the art instrumentation, to constrain and calibrate data from more spatially-comprehensive global observing systems (inc. satellites and current radiosonde networks), in order to fully characterize the properties of the atmospheric column and their changes.

GRUAN is envisaged as a network of 30-40 high-quality, long-term, upper-air observing stations, building on existing observational networks, such as NDACC, ARM, GUAN, GAW, BSRN and GSN. GRUAN builds on, but is not confined to, the larger GCOS Upper Air Network (GUAN).

In 2007, the GRUAN Lead Centre has been assigned to the Richard-Assmann-Observatory at Lindenberg, Germany. The GRUAN Lead Centre is responsible for the coordination among stations, including training, education and research, and ensuring the archival and dissemination of GRUAN Data.