Second International Conference on Opportunistic Sensing of Precipitation - OpenSense 2026

Session

Oral session #6

Jun 24, 2026, 3:30 PM

Building A (Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute)

5. 5G-and-beyond for high-resolution, high-accuracy opportunistic weather monitoring: 5G+-Weather

Sander Bronckers (Eindhoven University of Technology)

6/24/26, 3:30 PM

Comparative performance analysis and uncertainty assessment

High-resolution information on the space-time variability of rainfall is key for weather prediction, water management, agriculture and traffic control. However, in many areas around the world, rainfall data are not available at the required resolution. The need for rainfall information is only expected to increase during the coming decades in view of global change, with its projected growth of...

13. Country-wide rainfall estimates from a commercial microwave link network in Belgium

Kwinten Van Weverberg (Ghent University)

6/24/26, 3:45 PM

Comparative performance analysis and uncertainty assessment

Accurate quantitative precipitation estimation (QPE) at high spatiotemporal resolution remains challenging despite advances in observational technology. This study presents the first comprehensive evaluation of rainfall retrievals from a commercial microwave link (CML) network in Belgium, examining whether CML-derived rainfall can complement existing dense rain gauge and weather radar...

46. The signal beyond the noise

Sagi Alon

6/24/26, 4:00 PM

Comparative performance analysis and uncertainty assessment

Commercial microwave links (CMLs) have emerged as valuable infrastructure for the opportunistic sensing of rain. However, many networks exhibit persistent diurnal signal fluctuations in the absence of precipitation. Their physical origin remains relatively misunderstood, limiting the reliability of CMLs for atmospheric sensing and prompting for additional signal processing to avoid...

42. The importance of KPI standardization in validation studies of rainfall data retrieved by opportunistic sensors

Roberto Nebuloni (Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR)), Filippo Giannetti (University of Pisa)

6/24/26, 4:15 PM

Comparative performance analysis and uncertainty assessment

Rainfall data retrieved from opportunistic sensors, such as Commercial Microwave Links (CMLs) and Satellite Microwave Links (SMLs), must be validated against the ground truth (e.g., rain gauge or weather radar measurements) using rigorous procedures and standardized metrics, to enable meaningful comparisons across datasets and processing schemes. However, existing validation studies adopt...

16. The use of transformers for empirical study of the effect of different sampling protocols on rain estimation accuracy

Dr Jonatan Ostrometzky (Tel Aviv University)

6/24/26, 4:30 PM

Comparative performance analysis and uncertainty assessment

Rainfall estimation from commercial microwave links (CMLs) can be derived from existing signal level measurements, collected under various operational sampling protocols. One of the most widely used protocols reports only the extreme values (the minimum and the maximum values per a given interval; min-max in short) of the signal level, usually once per 15-minute interval. In this work, we...

32. Two fluxes from one device: opportunistic sensing of precipitation and evaporation using microwave links from cellular communication networks

Remko Uijlenhoet (TU Delft)

6/24/26, 4:45 PM

Comparative performance analysis and uncertainty assessment

Precipitation and evaporation are the two fluxes coupling the atmospheric and terrestrial compartments of the hydrologic cycle. Accurate and robust observations of the spatial and temporal variability of these two fluxes over the Earth’s continents is crucial to help understand the intricacies of land surface – atmosphere interactions. Improving our understanding and our ability to quantify...