A New Model for Elevation Change Estimation in Antarctica From Photon-Counting ICESat-2 Altimetric Data

Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) carries a photon-counting laser altimeter with an unprecedented elevation accuracy of 2–4 cm. Since its data availability in 2018, there has been a challenge for the establishment of a new data processing model that can take advantage of this satellite for accurately estimating volumetric changes in Antarctica and associated contribution to global sea level rise (GSLR). We introduce an innovative multitemporal elevation change estimation model (MECEM) that separates precipitation effects from topographic influences to eliminate their correlations and estimates the elevation change rates effectively through a spatiotemporal iterative procedure. The MECEM results are validated by using GNSS in situ observations, snow stakes measurements, and airborne altimetric survey data. The results are also compared with those from ICESat and ESA multimission radar altimetric dataset. It is demonstrated that the model is capable of estimating small thickening of
$1.8~\pm ~0.1$
cm yr1 in the Vostok subglacial lake region. Using ICESat-2 ATL06 data from 2019 to 2023, the model is proven to be effective in the estimation of elevation change rates in Antarctic basins of different characteristics. Our results show that an increase of
$0.103~\pm ~0.001$
m yr1 in thickening is found from 2017–2021 to 2019–2023 in Dronning Maud Land. Furthermore, an accelerated thinning by
$- 0.12~\pm ~0.035$
m yr1 is witnessed from 2003–2019 to 2019–2023 in the fast-flowing Pine Island Glacial. With more ICESat-2 data acquired, the developed MECEM model can be applied for estimating the contribution of the entire Antarctic ice sheet (AIS) to GSLR.