Programme
VOCALIS 2026 · 21 - 24 September 2026
Monday 21 September
Welcome
Chairs: Filomena Catapano (ESA), Ashley Morris (SIOS), Eva Le Merle (NOVELTIS)
14:00 - 14:10Eero Rinne (UNIS) - Practical information about Svalbard and VOCALIS
14:10 - 14:15Simonetta Cheli (ESA - ESRIN director) - Opening Welcome
14:15 - 14:25Tim Lemmens (European Commission / DG DEFIS) - Welcome address
14:25 - 14:35Pierre Potin (ESA) - Status and evolution of the Copernicus Space Component
14:35 - 14:45Anna Odh (Norwegian Space Agency) - Welcome address
14:45 - 14:55Heikki Lihavainen (SIOS director) - SIOS - an international collaboration to operate a regional Research Infrastructure
14:55 - 15:05Jøran Moen (UNIS director) - Welcome address
15:05 - 15:15KSAT - Welcome address
15:15 - 15:45Coffee break
15:45 - 16:10Tommaso Parinello (ESA) - Keynote address
16:10 - 16:20Jerome Bouffard (ESA) - Operational Copernicus Altimetry for Cryosphere and Hydrology: An ESA Perspective
16:20 - 16:30Filomena Catapano (ESA) - ESA Hydro-Cryo Altimetry Calibration and Validation roadmap
16:30 - 16:40Paolo Cipollini (ESA) - CRISTAL: One Year to Go
Ice Breaker at KSAT
Tuesday 22 September
Sea Ice
Chairs: Henriette Skourup (DTU), Eero Rinne (UNIS), Alessandro Di Bella (ESA)
15 min presentation + 5 min for questions
9:00 - 9:20Catherine Taelman (UiT) - Empirical evidence of overestimated Ku-band sea ice radar freeboards
9:20 - 9:40Arttu Jutila (Finnish Meteorological Institute) - Tara Polar Station for sea-ice altimetry cal/val activities
9:40 - 10:00Rachel Tilling (NASA/Uni. Maryland) - U.S. Cal/Val Activities for Radar and Laser Altimetry
10:00 - 10:20Torbjörn Kagel (NORCE) - Stories of (In)Consistency in Snow Depth Retrievals from a Multi-Scale Radar Altimetry Experiment
10:20 - 10:50Coffee break
10:50 - 11:10Kristina Belinska (DTU) - CRISTAL IN-PROVA: Validation Methodologies for In-Flight Level-2 Sea Ice Products
11:10 - 11:30Luisa Wagner (AWI) - Recent Results of IceBird Ice and Snow Thickness Measurements
11:30 - 11:50Sahra Kacimi (JPL) - Preparing for CRISTAL: Progress in NASA Sea Ice Algorithms and Airborne Validation
11:50 - 12:30Discussions
12:30 - 14:00Lunch
Land Ice
Chairs: Geir Moholdt (NPI), Sebastian Bjerregaard Simonsen (DTU), Martin Wearing (ESA)
15 min presentation + 5 min for questions
14:00 - 14:20Livia Jakob (Earthwave) - Validation of altimetry over mountain glaciers and ice shelves: lessons from CryoSat-2 and requirements for CRISTAL
14:20 - 14:40Jeremie Aublanc (CLS) - Recent advances in radar altimetry data acquisition and processing over land ice. Implications and recommendations for CalVal studies
14:40 - 15:00Stine Kildegaard Rose (DTU) - Status and Challenges of Sentinel-3 Land-Ice Altimetry Calibration and Validation
15:00 - 15:20Mal McMillan (Lancaster Uni.) - Validation of radar altimetry measurements over ice sheets: from ERS-1 to CRISTAL
15:20 - 15:50Coffee break
15:50 - 16:10Johan Nilsson (Uppsala Uni.) - Leveraging Experience from CryoSat-2 and SWOT Missions to Advance Future Capabilities of the CRISTAL and S3NG-T Missions
16:10 - 16:30Lucile Fayon (IGE) - Validation of Sentinel-3 Altimetry over the Antarctic Ice Sheet Using New In-Situ Fiducial Reference Measurements from the St3TART-FO stations: Methodology and First Comparisons
16:30 - 16:50Maria Kappelsberger (Dresden University of Technology) - Uncertainty assessment and validation of altimetric elevation and elevation change products in Antarctica
16:50 - 17:30Discussions
Wednesday 23 September
Inland Waters
Chairs: Julien Renou (CLS), Marco Restano (ATG-Europe for ESA)
15 min presentation + 5 min for questions
9:00 - 9:20Angelica Tarpanelli (CNR-GEO) - Sentinel-3 Altimetry for Inland Waters: Lessons Learned and Perspectives for the CRISTAL Mission
9:20 - 9:40Valentin Fouqueau (vorteX-io) - Towards multi-mission operational provision of FRMs for inland water validation across a wide range of water bodies
9:40 - 10:00Vincent Boulenger (NOVELTIS) - Diving into the St3TART-FO FRM Data Hub: Supporting the Evaluation of Sentinel-3 Inland Water Products
10:00 - 10:20Anna Mangilli (CLS) - Lake Ice Thickness from Radar Altimetry: Overview and Perspectives
10:20 - 10:50Coffee break
10:50 - 11:10Hervé Yésou (ICUBE SERTIT) - Sentinel 3 FRM over St3TART-FO complex site of Rhine and Old Rhine sections: assessment of S3 nadir and Off nadir data and potential contribution of SWOT data
11:10 - 11:30Fabrice Papa (IRD) - Tracking inland surface freshwater fluxes and storage variability from satellite altimetry
11:30 - 11:50Christian Schwatke (DGFI-TUM) - DAHITI: Combining SWOT KaRIn Measurements and Classical Nadir Altimetry for Monitoring Small Inland Waters
11:50 - 12:30Discussions
12:30 - 14:00Lunch
Copernicus in-situ
Chairs: Jose Miguel Rubio Iglesias, Ashley Morris (SIOS), Tania Casal (ESA)
15 min presentation + 5 min for questions
14:00 - 14:20Eero Rinne (UNIS) - In-situ opportunities on Svalbard - lessons learned from the past 4 field seasons
14:20 - 14:40Geir Moholdt (NPI) - Annual in-situ validation of satellite altimetry missions on Austfonna ice cap, Svalbard
14:40 - 15:00Hannakaisa Lindqvist (Finnish Meteorological Institute) - The expansion of the Cal/Val activities at the ESA-FMI Arctic-Boreal Earth Science, Calibration and Validation Supersite
15:00 - 15:20Jeremy Wilkinson (BAS) - Needs and gaps in in-situ observations: the Beyond Arctic PASSION approach
15:20 - 15:40Melody Sandells (Northumbria Uni.) - Snow and Sea Ice properties from the CEMSIE field experiment
15:40 - 16:10Coffee break
16:10 - 17:30Panel Discussion moderated by Jose Miguel Rubio Iglesias (EEA) with participation of Tim Lemmens (EEA), Lorenzo Solari (EEA), Eero Rinne (UNIS), Filomena Catapano (ESA), Antonio Reppucci (Mercator Ocean), and Sara Fleury (LEGOS)
19:00Social Dinner at Restaurant Nansen (Radisson Hotel)
Thursday 24 September
Uncertainty estimation methodologies, towards metrology approach
Chairs: Alexa Putnam (NPL), Michele Scagliola (ESA)
15 min presentation + 5 min for questions
9:00 - 9:20Henriette Skourup (DTU) - Uncertainty Quantification in the Validation of Level-2 Sea Ice and Iceberg Products
9:20 - 9:40Lucile Fayon (IGE) - Achieving Decimeter-Level Accuracy for Antarctic FRMs: Uncertainty characterization of the St3TART-FO stations
9:40 - 10:00Sajedeh Behnia (NPL)
10:00 - 10:20Alexa Putnam (NPL) - Sigma-0 Uncertainty in Sea Ice Altimetry Measurements
10:20 - 10:50Coffee break
10:50 - 11:10Mal McMillan (Lancaster Uni.) - Developing a framework for evaluating ice sheet altimetry uncertainty estimates
11:10 - 11:30Jack Landy (UiT The Arctic University of Norway) - Where is the uncertainty in Arctic sea ice thickness estimates from satellite altimetry?
11:30 - 11:50Sara Fleury (LEGOS/CNRS) - From measurements to sea ice and snow thickness uncertainties: application to CalVal strategies
11:50 - 12:30Discussions
12:30 - 14:00Lunch
Multi-mission validation synergies
Chairs: Paolo Cipollini (ESA), Jerome Bouffard (ESA), Anja Stromme (ESA)
15 min presentation + 5 min for questions
14:00 - 14:20Paolo Cipollini (ESA) - Synergy of the Copernicus Polar Expansion Missions, from concept to operations
14:20 - 14:40Vishnu Nandan (UiT The Arctic University of Norway) - The 2026 ESA SUPFIX-POLAR Copernicus Expansion Missions Sea Ice Experiment (CEMSIE): First Looks from the Campaign
14:40 - 15:00Ferran Hernández-Macià (Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM-CSIC)) - Synergistic use of altimeter backscatter to improve radiometer thin sea ice thickness retrieval
15:00 - 15:30Coffee break
15:30 - 15:50Gunnar Spreen (University of Bremen) - Synergies in validation and operation over sea ice of altimeters with CIMR, the Copernicus Imaging Microwave Radiometer
15:50 - 16:10Ferran Gibert (isardSAT) - CRISTALair: status and readiness for CRISTAL Cal/Val
16:10 - 16:30Discussions
16:30 - 17:30Wrap-up
End of the meeting