Haleakala Mountaintop GNSS-R Experiment:

First Year Assessment

Brian Breitsch, University of Colorado Boulder

BIOGRAPHY
Brian Breitsch is a postdoc at the University of Colorado, Boulder, where he received his PhD in Aerospace Engineering
Sciences. His research interests include estimation and error mitigation techniques applied to GNSS remote-sensing applications.

ABSTRACT
Measurements of signals from GNSS satellites have become an important tool for various scientific and remote-sensing
applications. GNSS reflectometry (GNSS-R) is a compelling use of GNSS signals for measuring the Earth’s suface, including
altimetry, surface roughness, and reflectivity. The CU SeNSe Lab has deployed a mountaintop data collection system for
observing

I. INTRODUCTION
GNSS signals that were initially developed for positioning, navigation, and timing applications are now routinely being used
to sense the Earth surface using GNSS reflectometry (GNSS-R) techniques. Current GNSS-R techniques can broadly be
classified as those using terrestrial, air-borne, or spaceborne receivers. These three platforms come with their own advantages
and disadvantages when it comes to ease of deployment and operation, ground track coverage, measurement footprint, and the
techniques that can be applied. The primary difference in measurements for terrestrial versus airborne/spaceborne receivers is
that for the latter the path length difference between direct and reflected signals is usually larger than 1 code chip (for 1 MHz codes
used in most GNSS signals) and so the direct and reflected signals can be separated. This allows generation of delay-Doppler
maps for the reflected signal, which have been used by the Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System (CYGNSS) to monitor
ocean surface wind speeds during hurricanes. It also allows for measurement of coherent reflected signal phase, which has been
used for surface altimetry over sea and inland water surfaces, wetlands, and sea ice. Meanwhile, for terrestrial receivers where
the direct and reflected paths are separated by less than one chip, the interferometric reflectometry (GNSS-IR) technique can be
applied and has been used to measure parameters such as soil moisture, snow depth, and vegetation growth.
A notable exception to this distinction between terrestrial and airborne/spaceborne GNSS-R is the case of mountaintop GNSS-R,
which confers the operational and measurement footprint advantages of terrestrial receivers along with the direct/reflected path
length separation obtained using airborne/spaceborne platforms. In light of this, the University of Colorado, Boulder SeNSe Lab
developed and deployed a GNSS data collection site on top of Mount Haleakala on the island of Maui, Hawaii, to act as a test
bed for potential future on-orbit GNSS-R algorithms while exploring the applications of multi-frequency and multi-polarization
measurements. In June 2021 a data collection campaign was initiated where raw samples of the reflected GNSS signals were
periodically recorded for multiple signal bands and dual antenna polarizations. In this work, we provide an assessment of the first
year of data collected for the Mount Haleakala GNSS-R experiment. We apply open-loop processing to measure the amplitude,
code phase, and carrier phase of the reflected signals for both antenna polarizations and GPS L1CA and L2C signals. We then
assess the characteristics of the measured amplitude and phase and how they are impacted by polarization, signal frequency, and
ocean surface conditions. So far, our assessment of these data show that signal reflections over coastal water south of Haleakala
are characterized by rapid amplitude fluctuations along with the presence of cycle slips in the carrier phase. We compare these
fluctuations in received amplitude to local ocean surface wave parameters and assess how their characteristics change in space
and over time. Ultimately, this work provides a foundation for improving the processing of future spaceborne GNSS-R missions
as well as validates the use of mountaintop GNSS-R for coastal water surface monitoring.

II. EXPERIMENT BACKGROUND

In June 2020, the CU SeNSe Lab deployed the a GNSS data collection system on top of Mount Haleakala. There is one
side-facing dual-polarization horn antenna and one zenith facing reference antenna. Figure ?? shows the side-facing horn
antenna in its radome enclosure. The signals from these antennae are fed into the front-end hardware setup depicted in Figure 2.
The horn antenna hardware produces two wideband GNSS signals in left-hand circular (LHC) and right-hand circular (RHC)
polarizations. These signals are split and sent to two different Universal Software Radio Peripherals (USRPs). Each USRP can
support up to 4 signals and 2 separate mixdown frequencies. The system is configured so that the first USRP samples the GPS

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35th International Technical Meeting of the Satellite Division of the 3701 https://doi.org/10.33012/2022.18484
Institute of Navigation (ION GNSS+ 2022), September 19-23, 2022
 Figure 1: Photo of the side-facing horn antenna in its radome enclosure.

Figure 2: Hardware block diagram of the data collection frontend system.

L1 and L2 bands and the second samples the GPS L5 band (both LHC and RHC polarizations). These samples are streamed
to disk on a nearby data acquisition server. Meanwhile, the reference zenith antenna is fed into a Septentrio PolaRxS receiver,
and its tracked outputs are written to disk in the Septentrio Binary Format (SBF). In this system, each of the USRPs are driven
by the Septentrio’s onboard high-quality OCXO, which allows us to use the Septentrio tracked outputs to estimate the receiver
clock variations, though the estimate must additionally be calibrated for a bias.
We began a data collection campaign in June 2021, periodically collecting raw intermediate frequency (IF) data for 1 hour at
around 11:00 and 14:00 UT each day. Figure 5 shows the available datasets over the course of the campaign. Figure 3 shows
examples of the specular point tracks during one of these one-hour collection periods and indicates the specular point grazing
angle (elevation angle of the satellite at the specular point) by the track color. For all collections, the side-facing horn antenna
is static and facing roughly south. With a beam width of around 60 degrees both vertical and horizontal, this position is ideal
for collecting direct signals from mid- to low-elevation satellites and ocean-reflected signals in the region south and southeast
of the island where there is no blockage from the main island of Hawaii.
Our results in this paper focus on the GPS PRN 5 (G05) satellite pass, whose specular point moves away from the island as the
satellite is setting. Note that satellite elevations relative to the receiving antenna will be slightly less than the specular point
grazing angle, and are generally 10 degrees or less while specular point tracks to the south of the island are over the ocean.
While most of the reflected signal power is concentrated in LCH polarization for higher grazing angles, around 10 degrees or
lower the reflected signal polarizations are a mix of LHC and RHC polarizations. For further insight, Figure ?? shows the
specular reflectivity for an incident RHC polarized GPS L1 signal. Note how below 10 degrees the reflected signal starts mixing
between the two polarizations. The Brewster angle occurs when the reflectivities for the two polarizations are equal, at around
6 degrees. Also note how the RHC reflectivity dominates as grazing angle approaches zero. The variability of reflectivity for
different polarizations at such low grazing angles suggests potential polarimetric measurement techniques for inferring surface
properties that affect reflectivity, such as water temperature. Such techniques will be one of our topics for future investigation.

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 Figure 3: Specular points for GPS satellites during a 1-hour window from 15:30 to 16:30 UT.

III. PROCESSING METHODOLOGY

In order to obtain GNSS measurements from direct or reflected signals, typically they must be tracked by a receiver. However
reflected signal power can vary rapidly and the coherent reflection is not a reliable signal to track. Additionally, the direct
signal will be at low elevation during ocean reflections (less than 10 degrees) and may also be unreliable due to tropospheric
scintillation, multipath interference, or low SNR. Therefore, for this experiment, the direct signal cannot be relied upon when
processing the reflected signals. In this case for a static antenna, a flexible, computationally efficient, and reliable processing
methodology is to generate a model of the satellite pseudorange and perform open-loop processing of the signals. This is our
approach for processing the Haleakala reflections, except that we will first acquire the direct signal when the satellite is at a
higher elevation and use those acquisition results to align our open-loop model to the signal in the IF data. While it is certainly
desirable to have an open-loop model that is accurate enough to allow for performing signal correlations without relying on
a signal acquisition stage, there are remaining biases in our model generation due to hardware or other factors that have not
been worked out yet. Increasing our model accuracy is a topic for further investigation, but for now this approach has proven
sufficient to begin processing and analysis of the reflection data.
Figure 4 outlines the approach for generating the open-loop model and processing the IF data. In order to generate our open-loop
model, it is important to estimate the system clock error. Since the USRPs are locked to the Septentrio reference oscillator, the
Septentrio measurements from the zenith antenna can be used to estimate the clock variations that are associated with variations
in the reference oscillator. To estimate these clock variations, we utilize the geodetic detrending technique described in [1]. This
technique utilizes a surveyed antenna position along with satellite orbit and clock products from the International GNSS Service
(IGS). The receiver and satellite antenna positions are also used to determine satellite elevations and specular tracks, which are
then used to determine which signals are viable for processing. Signals that can be processed are acquired when the satellite
is at 20 degree elevation, and the open-loop model is aligned to the acquired code phase. From there, the standard reference
generation and correlation procedures are performed for different time epochs, code delay offsets, and Doppler frequency
offsets. The resulting I/Q (real/imaginary) components of the correlations are then used to estimate signal SNR and carrier
phase. Results computed for multiple code delays at a given epoch are colled delay maps, while results computed for different
code delay and Doppler offsets are called delay-Doppler maps.
In this paper, we will only present results on the signal SNR. For different code delay and Doppler offsets and at different time
epochs, we perform 2 millisecond coherent integrations and non-coherently sum the correlation magnitudes over Nncoh = 20
consecutive blocks.
√ To estimate SNR from I/Q correlation outputs, we take the square of the sum of correlation magnitudes
and divide it by Nncoh σϵ2 , where σϵ2 is the estimated variance√of the noise in the 2 millisecond correlation blocks. Note that
this assumes a non-coherent integration gain approximation of Nncoh . In order to estimate the noise variance, we consider the
variance of I/Q correlation components for the +1 delay bin (which should not contain any direct or reflected signal components)
computed over the whole dataset. We compute one noise variance for a given satellite pass for a given polarization.

P q 2
Nncoh
j=1 I2j + Q2j
SNR = √ (1)
Nncoh · σϵ2

IV. RESULTS AND ANALYSIS

Here we will show SNR processing results for a particular pass of satellite G05. Figure 6 shows DDMs computed over the
course of the pass. In these DDMs, the direct signal appears as a bright spot near zero code delay while the reflected signal

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 Figure 4: Block diagram illustrating the processing steps for producing DDM and delay-map SNR products.

Figure 5: Shows the data availability over the course of several months, along with the average significant wave height near the coast.

RX1 GPS L1 LHC

RX1 GPS L1 LHC
RX1 GPS L1 LHC
RX1 GPS L1 LHC
RX1 GPS L1 LHC
RX1 GPS L1 LHC
RX1 GPS L1 LHC
RX1 GPS L1 LHC
Table 1: Data IDs with corresponding band and polarization

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 Figure 6: DDMs computed for the RHC polarization GPS L1CA and GP2 L2C signals for G05.

Figure 7: Delay maps computed for the RHC (top panel) and LHC (bottom panel) polarizations of the GPS L1CA signal for G05.

appears somewhat fainter at a negative code delay. Red dots in the figure indicate the predicted code delay and Doppler based
on our open-loop model. As the satellite sets, the reflected signal and direct signal path lengths merge, and the two distinct
spots in the DDMs become one. This happens at around a 3-degree satellite elevation. We note that the L2 signal is moderately
weaker than the L1 signal, and its DDMs show less scattered power in distant delay/Doppler bins.
We also note that the direct signal SNR is relatively consistent, while the reflected signal SNR is sometimes bright and sometimes
more faint. This effect can be seen in better detail in Figure 7, which shows delay maps for the L1 signal during this pass for both
RHC (top panel) and LHC (bottom panel) polarizations. The red line in these figures indicates the model-predicted code phase
for the specular reflected signal. There appears to be around a 1/2 chip drift in the model offset relative to the reflected signal
over the course of the pass, indicating that further assessment and refinement of the open-loop model may be necessary. We
also note that the LHC polarization is much smaller in magnitude for the reflected signal, however the direct signal magnitudes
are comparable. This issue in the results is a topic that requires further investigation, but there could be some level of leakage
in the antenna hardware or local ground multipath contamination between the signals.
Since delay maps require fewer overall correlations to generate, it is easier to produce them at finer time resolution. In this case,
it allows us to observe the pattern of signal fading that is occurring for the reflected signals. Figure 8 shows a close-up version
of the top panel from Figure 7. In the reflected signal, there are deep and rapid fluctuations in the SNR. These fluctuations are
problematic for GNSS-R applications that would require coherent reflections, such as carrier-based altimetry. However, we also
believe they could be indications of Bragg scattering and may contain information about the scale of structures on the ocean
surface. Again, further work will be necessary to determine the cause and consequences of this behavior.

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 Figure 8: A close-up look at the delay-map from the top panel of Figure 7.

V. CONCLUSION
In this paper, we introduced a mountaintop GNSS-R instrument that was developed and deployed by the CU SeNSe Lab. We
discussed the essential aspects of the experiment setup and introduced a methodology for open-loop processing of the ocean-
reflected signals. This methodology allows us to produce DDMs and delay maps of the SNR for multiple signal frequencies and
received polarizations. We presented some initial results of this processing procedure for the G05 satellite pass. While there
are some issues with the data, such as potential hardware leakage between polarizations and rapid fluctuation of the reflected
signal intensity, observing the differences in the DDMs and delay maps for different signal frequencies and polarizations is a
promising first step towards extracting useful GNSS-R observations from this data.

REFERENCES
[1] A. Rovira-Garcia, J. M. Juan, J. Sanz, and G. Gonzalez-Casado, “The geodetic detrending technique: enabling high-accuracy
navigation under scintillation,” in 2020 IEEE International Conference on Wireless for Space and Extreme Environments
(WiSEE). IEEE, 2020, pp. 1–4.

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