ASSESSING EFFICIENCY OF GPS EPHEMERIDES IN DIFFERENT REGION USING PRECISE POINT POSITIONING

Abstract

Precise Point Positioning (PPP) is a technique that process Global Positioning System (GPS) observation that can achieve sub-decimetre accuracy. Precise ephemerides that contain satellite clock and position plays a vital role in minimising orbital and clock error in PPP. This study hypothesize that the efficiency of ephemerides varies across region, influenced by the density of stations involved in generating the ephemerides. GPS observations from stations in five different regions were processed using PPP technique by using RTKLIB. Four types of ephemerides were used namely broadcast, ultra-rapid, rapid, and final ephemerides during the processing of each station. Root-mean-squared error (RMSE) of 3D error of the PPP solution for the stations in each region is quantified. Among the five regions selected, Europe has the lowest RMSE of 155.67 cm, 27.93 cm, 27.38 cm and 27.06 cm for broadcast, ultra-rapid, rapid, and final ephemeris respectively. This high accuracy can be attributed to the density of International GNSS Service (IGS) stations in Europe that are available for the generation of ephemerides. Position Dilution of Precision (PDOP) was also found to contribute to the accuracy of PPP solution in a region, whereby a low PDOP often promises higher positioning accuracy. More regional stations are suggested to be involved in the generation of ephemerides to improve the efficiency of ephemerides in that region.