Future Plans
If users would like to see specific functionality added to AAPP, please contact the Help Desk to submit your suggestions.
Planned developments include:
Metop-A/B/C
Continued support for the instruments on Metop, up to the end of life of Metop-C (i.e. late 2020s or beyond).
Metop-SG
Pre-processing for MWS, IASI-NG and METimage instruments on Metop-SG-A1, scheduled for launch in late 2025. See the following documents:
Design proposals for EPS-SG pre-processing in AAPP and MWIPP (June 2021, updated November 2024)
AAPP v9 Top Level Design (May 2022)
AAPP v9 Product Specification (May 2022)
Technical report: Adapting the AAPP microwave tests for EPS-SG (May 2022)
Technical report: Adapting the AAPP microwave tests for EPS-SG: part 2 – surface tests (Aug 2022)
Note that for direct broadcast the conversion from raw to level 1b will not be part of AAPP, it will be performed by seperate software to be procured by EUMETSAT and distributed by the NWP SAF.
Arctic Weather Satellite and EPS-Sterna
Direct Broadcast software (level 0 to level 1B) for the microwave radiometer (MWR) on the Arctic Weather Satellite (AWS-1) is being procured by ESA. When ready (expected March 2025), the package will be made available to users via the NWP SAF web site. Level 1B will be in netCDF format with different geolocation (lat, lon, etc.) for the four feedhorns.
Ingest, re-mapping (to level 1C) and BUFR encoding capability has been added as a new AAPP module which is included in AAPP v8.14. See the AAPP-AWS User manual. This supports both global and direct broadcast data. ESA also plan to deliver a separate level 1B to 1C converter; post-launch analysis will compare the ESA software with the NWP SAF software. So far (Jan 2025) we are not allowed to distribute an AWS-1 test case for AAPP, but will do so later.
For the follow-on EPS-Sterna constellation (if the programme is approved by EUMETSAT Council), responsibility for level 0 to 1B software will fall to EUMETSAT. It is expected that AAPP will continue to support these instruments in a similar way to Arctic Weather Satellite.