Māris Kaļinka

Development of the One Centimeter Accuracy Geoid Model of Latvia for GNSS Measurements

There is an urgent necessity for a highly accurate and reliable geoid model to enable prompt determination of normal height with the use of GNSS coordinate determination due to the high precision requirements in geodesy, building and high precision road construction development. Additionally, the Latvian height system is in the process of transition from BAS- 77 (Baltic Height System) to EVRS2007 system. The accuracy of the geoid model must approach the precision of about ~1 cm looking forward to the Baltic Rail and other big projects. The use of all the available and verified data sources is planned, including the use of enlarged set of GNSS/levelling data, gravimetric measurement data and, additionally, the vertical deflection measurements over the territory of Latvia. The work is going ahead stepwise. Just the issue of GNSS reference network stability is discussed. In order to achieve the ~1 cm precision geoid, it is required to have a homogeneous high precision GNSS network as a basis for ellipsoidal height determination for GNSS/levelling points. Both the LatPos and EUPOS® - Riga network have been examined in this article.

Analysis of Land Cover Change in a Coastal Area using Remotely Sensed Data

Coastal area monitoring is a significant task in the national development and environmental protection. Study area of this work is the Baltic Sea Region, particularly focusing on the land cover changes in the coastal area from Cape Kolka to the Latvian-Lithuanian border. The aim of this research is to estimate and illustrate different examples of monitoring and mapping land cover changes in the coastal area using remotely sensed data - orthophoto, multispectral data and radar data. The results of the research include vector maps created from satellite images and comparison between different land cover value identification methods.

The Near Real Time Ionospheric Model of Latvia

A highly accurate ionosphere model is necessary to enable a fast and reliable coordinate determination with GNSS in real time. It is a partially ionized atmospheric region ranging up to 1,000 km height, affected by spatial variations, space weather, seasonal and solar cycle dependence. New approaches and algorithms of modelling techniques are sought to provide better solutions in the territory of Latvia. Ionospheric TEC value has large differences in Western Latvia and Eastern Latvia. Actual ionospheric map should be calculated and delivered to the surveyors near real time and published on the WEB. Delivering actual map to rover GNSS devices in a field will provide the surveyors with ionospheric conditions and allow choosing best time for surveying and making geodetic measurements with higher accuracy and reliability.