SWOT Level 2 Lake Single-Pass Vector Data: Water Elevation, Area, and Storage Change

From December 2022 through an expected 2025 science phase, the Surface Water Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission's KaRIn instrument provides water surface elevation, area, and storage change for lakes. Data is organized into three vector datasets: observation-oriented features, prior database (PLD)-oriented features, and unassigned water features not in prior databases. This collection contains Version C science data products distributed as ESRI Shapefiles.

Use Cases

• Monitoring lake water storage changes over time based on derived storage change metrics.
• Validating and updating prior lake databases (PLD) using the PLD-oriented feature dataset.
• Identifying previously unmapped water bodies from the unassigned features dataset.
• Analyzing seasonal and interannual variations in water surface elevation for inland and coastal lakes.

Strengths

• Data originates from the SWOT satellite, a dedicated mission launched on December 16, 2022, providing a dedicated observation source.
• The dataset differentiates between known and newly detected water bodies through its three distinct feature datasets.
• Cross-platform presence on datagov and nasa_earthdata signals established importance and curation.

Limitations

• Key metadata such as row count, file size, and specific column names are not provided by any source.
• The license is ambiguously listed as 'other-license-specified' without explicit terms.
• Data freshness is unclear; the last update date (2026-04-09) is a future date relative to the mission timeline, suggesting a potential metadata error.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Surface Water Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission.

Collection Method

Derived from the high rate (HR) data stream of the Ka-band Radar Interferometer (KaRIn) onboard the SWOT satellite.

Time Range

Calibration phase from launch (December 2022) to early July 2023; science phase from August 2023 expected through 2025.

Freshness

Last updated date listed as 2026-04-09, which conflicts with the mission timeline described.

Geography

Global, covering inland and coastal hydrology surfaces as controlled by the KaRIn HR mask.