AIRS (Atmospheric InfraRed Sounder): Version 6 Level 2
Years of Record: 2002/08 to 2016/09
AIRS Version 6 Level 2 data represent a significant improvement over AIRS Version 5 Level 2 products in terms of greater stability, yield, and quality. Several algorithmic improvements have been made by the AIRS Project in conjunction with the AIRS Science Team. Improvements include: (a)...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: HDF | HDF-EOS
Timestep: Sub-daily
Domain: Global
AIRS and AMSU: Trace Gases (CO2, CO, CH4, O3...); Level 3
AIRS provides satellite retrieval of mid-tropospheric carbon dioxide even under cloudy conditions, without the use of a priori information from models. AIRS retrievals use cloud-cleared thermal IR radiance spectra in the 15 micron band with an accuracy better than 2 ppm. AIRS retrievals have been...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | HDF-EOS
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
AIRS and AMSU: Tropospheric air temperature and specific humidity
Years of Record: 2002/09 to 2011/05
The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) project has generated decadal-length,
global, gridded data sets of temperature and specific humidity for several standard
levels in the troposphere for the obs4MIPS project. This obs4MIPS version of the
AIRS data are available at monthly resolution, 1ºx1º...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
Amundsen Sea Low indices
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2015/07
The Amundsen Sea Low (ASL) is a climatological low pressure center located over the extreme southern Pacific Ocean, off the coast of West Antarctica. Atmospheric variability in this region is larger than anywhere else in the Southern Hemisphere, and exhibits significant correlations with both...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Monthly,Seasonal,Annual
Domain: Antarctic, SH - Southern Hemisphere, Southern Ocean
Antarctic Seasonal Pressure Reconstructions 1905-2013
Years of Record: 1905/01 to 2013/12
This dataset consists of seasonally resolved timeseries of surface pressure at 18 Antarctic research stations, spanning 1905-2013. Routine meteorological observations began at most of these stations only around 1960, leaving a very short instrumental record on which to assess Antarctic...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii | Spreadsheet
Timestep: Seasonal
Domain: Antarctic
Arctic System Reanalysis (ASR)
Years of Record: 2000/01 to 2012/12
The Arctic System Reanalysis is a multi-agency, university-led retrospective analysis (reanalysis) of the Greater Arctic. ASR is produced using high-resolution versions of the Polar Weather Forecast Model (PWRF) and the WRF-VAR and High Resolution Land Data Assimilation (HRLDAS) data assimilation...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Arctic
Atmospheric Reanalysis: Overview & Comparison Tables
Reanalysis a systematic approach to produce data sets for climate monitoring and research. Reanalyses are created via an unchanging ("frozen") data assimilation scheme and model(s) which ingest all available observations every 6-12 hours over the period being analyzed. This unchanging framework...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Budgets: Mass, Moisture, Energy
The uneven distribution of incoming and outgoing radiation is the primary driver of the climate system. The resulting flows of energy by the climate components (atmosphere, ocean, ice, etc) determine the climate. Ultimately, the net difference between incoming and outgoing radiation determines if...
Main variables and Earth System components:
CALIPSO
Years of Record: 2006/06 to 2017/01
CALIPSO (Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations ) was launched on April 28, 2006 to study the impact of clouds and aerosols on the Earth's radiation budget and climate. It flies in formation with five other satellites in the international "A-Train" constellation for...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily
Domain: Global
CCMP: Cross-Calibrated Multi-Platform wind vector analysis
Years of Record: 1987/07 to 2016/05
The CCMP wind analysis is a near-global, high spatial and temporal resolution gridded dataset of surface wind vectors spanning 1987-present. The input data are a combination of inter-calibrated satellite data from numerous radiometers and scatterometers and in-situ data from moored buoys....
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Sub-daily
Domain: Global
CERA-20C: ECMWF's Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere Reanalysis of the 20th Century
Years of Record: 1901/01 to 2010/12
The CERA-20C is a global, coupled reanalysis spanning 1901-2010 with a focus on low-frequency climate variability. Similar to ERA-20C, the surface observations assimilated include surface pressures from the International Surface Pressure Databank v3.2.6 and ICOADS v 2.5.1, and surface winds...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
CHELSA high-resolution land surface temperature and precipitation
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2013/12
The Climatologies at high resolution for the Earth's land surface (CHELSA) dataset contains high spatial resolution monthly climatologies of mean, maximum and minimum temperatures and mean precipitation, representing the period 1979-2013. CHELSA is essentially a statistical downscaling of the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: GeoTIFF
Timestep: Climatology
Domain: Global
CHOMPS: CICS High-Resolution Optimally Interpolated Microwave Precipitation from Satellites
Years of Record: 1998/01 to 2007/12
CHOMPS utilizes all available passive microwave satellite estimates to develop improved global daily rainfall time series. No IR values are used. Satellite sources include SSM/I, AMSU, AMSR-E and TRMM. The most recent/accurate and consistent retrieval schemes have been used in the creation of the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: binary
Timestep: Daily
Domain: Global
CLARA-A1: Cloud properties, surface albedo and surface radiation products based on AVHRR
Years of Record: 1982/01 to 2009/12
"CLARA-A1 (CLoud, Albedo and RAdiation dataset, AVHRR-based, version 1) is a global dataset of cloud properties, surface albedo and surface radiation products, generated by the EUMETSAT Satellite Application Facility on Climate Monitoring (CM SAF). The products are derived from measurements of the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Daily,Monthly,Pentad
Domain: Global
Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (CFSR)
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2017/11
The CFSR is a third generation reanalysis product. It is a global, high resolution, coupled atmosphere-ocean-land surface-sea ice system designed to provide the best estimate of the state of these coupled domains over this period. The CFSR includes (1) coupling of atmosphere and ocean during the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Cloud Dataset Overview
Years of Record: 1982/01 to 2009/12
Clouds cover about 70% of the earth's surface. They are important components of the cliimate's water and energy budgets. Historically, cloud reports have come from station or ship observations. The satellite observation era, beginning in the 1980’s and spanning now more than 30 years, allows...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly
Domain: Global
Cloud observations from MODIS
Years of Record: 2000/03 to 2018/05
The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) is scanning instrument that makes measurements in 36 spectral bands from the visible to the thermal infrared at spatial resolutions from 250 m to 1 km. There are MODIS instruments aboard two sun-synchronous polar-orbiting NASA satellites:...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | HDF-EOS
Timestep: Daily,Monthly,Weekly
Domain: Global
CloudSat
Years of Record: 2006/06 to 2010/11
CloudSat is a satellite mission designed to measure the vertical structure of clouds from space. The radar data produces detailed images of cloud structures.
CloudSat is one of a constellation of satellites known as the A-Train (Cloudsat, CALIPSO, PARASOL, Aqua, Aura, GCOM-W1). The satellites fly...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
CMAP: CPC Merged Analysis of Precipitation
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2018/09
CMAP refers to a collection of precipitation data sets, though the 2.5°x2.5° global monthly version is probably the most widely used. This data set is constructed from an analysis of gauge data and satellite-derived precipitation estimates. An "enhanced" version (CMAP/A) is also available, which...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Monthly,Pentad
Domain: Global
CMORPH (CPC MORPHing technique): High resolution precipitation (60S-60N)
Years of Record: 2002/12 to 2017/10
"CMORPH (CPC MORPHing technique) produces global precipitation analyses at very high spatial and temporal resolution. This technique uses precipitation estimates that have been derived from low orbiter satellite microwave observations exclusively, and whose features are transported via spatial...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | binary
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily
Domain: Global
Combined CloudSat spaceborne radar and CALIPSO spaceborne lidar cloud fraction dataset
Years of Record: 2006/07 to 2011/02
A global (82S-82N) cloud fraction data set, providing a unique view of cloud vertical structure, has been developed based on the complimentary spaceborne remote sensing capabilities of the CloudSat radar and the CALISPSO lidar. The data set provides monthly mean cloud fraction over several vertical...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly,Seasonal,Annual
Domain: Global
COREv2 Air-Sea Surface Fluxes
Years of Record: 1949/01 to 2006/12
The Coordinated Ocean Research Experiments version 2 (COREv2) data set consists of a globally complete set of air-sea fluxes of momentum, heat and freshwater for 1948-2009 at monthly resolution. This data set serves as a set of common atmospheric boundary conditions that has been used...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
CPC Unified Gauge-Based Analysis of Global Daily Precipitation
Years of Record: 1948/01 to 2018/06
A gauge-based analysis of daily precipitation has been constructed over the global land areas. Gauge reports from over 30,000 stations are collected from multiple sources including GTS, COOP, and other national and international agencies. Quality control is performed through comparisons with...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: binary
Timestep: Daily
Domain: Global
CRU TS Gridded precipitation and other meteorological variables since 1901
Years of Record: 1901/01 to 2015/12
The CRU TS series of data sets (CRU TS = Climatic Research Unit Timeseries) contain monthly timeseries of precipitation, daily maximum and minimum temperatures, cloud cover, and other variables covering Earth's land areas for 1901-2015 (CRU TS4.0 is a recent release). The data set is gridded to 0....
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly
Domain: Global
Daymet: Daily Surface Weather and Climatological Summaries
Years of Record: 1980/01 to 2015/12
Developed by Dr. Peter E Thornton to fulfill the need for daily climatological data necessary for plant growth model inputs, Daymet generates daily, gridded surfaces of temperature, precipitation, humidity, and radiation over large regions and takes into account areas of complex terrain.
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Climatology,Daily
Domain: North America
Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE): 1985-89
Years of Record: 1985/01 to 1989/12
The Goddard Space Flight Center built the Earth Radiation Budget Satellite (ERBS) on which the first ERBE instruments were launched by the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1984. ERBE instruments were also launched on two National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather monitoring satellites, NOAA...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
ERA-15
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 1993/12
The ERA-15 production system generated re-analyses for 15 years (1979-1993) using a special version of their 1995 operational data assimilation system and model. The resulting analyses include full model resolution analyses or reduced resolution analyses and climate and statistics data...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
ERA-Interim
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2018/09
Using a much improved atmospheric model and assimilation system from those used in ERA-40, ERA-Interim represents a third generation reanalysis. Several of the inaccuracies exhibited by ERA-40 such as too-strong precipitation over oceans from the early 1990's onwards and a too-strong Brewer-Dobson...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
ERA-Interim: derived components
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2015/12
Era-Interim data are used to derive monthly mass, moisture and energy budget products. Each term is available.
Atmospheric energy, mass, and moisture budgets can be computed by vertically integrating reanalysis fields and employing suitable corrections (e.g. mass). The budgets are uniquely...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
ERA40
Years of Record: 1957/09 to 2002/08
ERA 40 is a second generation reanalysis. It is the first reanalysis to directly assimilate satellite radiance data (TOVS, SSM/I, ERS and ATOVS). Cloud Motion Winds are also used. The result is better circulation over the tropics and southern hemisphere. However, unless comparing to previous...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
FLASHFlux: Fast Longwave And Shortwave Radiative Fluxes
Years of Record: 2016/11 to 2018/08
FLASHFlux provides near real-time (7-8 days) quantification of surface radiative fluxes which are important for understanding the impact of changes to the Earth's surface and the atmospheric state on surface radiative fluxes.
An operational subsystem which uses a portion of the existing CERES...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: HDF
Timestep: Daily
Domain: Global
FLUXNET: MTE (Multi-Tree Ensemble)
Years of Record: 1982/01 to 2007/12
Global, spatially and temporally explicit estimates of carbon and water fluxes derived from empirical up-scaling eddy covariance measurements would constitute a new and possibly powerful data stream to study the variability of the global terrestrial carbon and water cycle. Jung et al (2009)
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: binary
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
GHCN-D: Global Historical climatology Network daily temperatures
Years of Record: 1880/01 to 2016/03
The Global Historical Climatology Network Daily database, GHCN-D, contains meteorological measurements from over 90,000 stations across the globe. The majority of station records contain precipitation data only, however other key variables including maximum temperature, minimum temperature,...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Daily
Domain: Global
GHCNDEX: Gridded Temperature and Precipitation Climate Extremes Indices (CLIMDEX data)
Years of Record: 1951/01 to 2014/02
GHCNDEX provides gridded, station-based indices of temperature- and precipitation- related climate extremes. It is intended for climate change detection and attribution studies, climate model evaluation, and operational monitoring of extreme climatic events. Twenty-six indices, including daily...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
Global (land) precipitation and temperature: Willmott & Matsuura, University of Delaware
Years of Record: 1900/01 to 2014/12
A series of gridded temperature and precipitation data sets. Station records that served as bases for the Terrestrial Air Temperature: 1900-2014 Gridded Monthly Time Series (Version 4.01) and Terrestrial Precipitation: 1900-2014 Gridded Monthly Time Series (Version 4.01) archives are used here to...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly
Domain: Global
Global surface temperature data: HadCRUT4 and CRUTEM4
Years of Record: 1850/01 to 2018/09
Extending back to 1850 and frequently updated, HadCRUT4 is the longest data set of its type. HadCRUT4 is a combination of the global land surface temperature data set, CRUTEM4 and the global SST data set, HadSST3. HadCRUT4 is different from the most closely comparable products (e.g. NASA GISTEMP...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | KML
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly
Domain: Global
Global surface temperatures: BEST: Berkeley Earth Surface Temperatures
Years of Record: 1701/01 to 2013/03
The Berkeley Earth Surface Temperatures (BEST) are a set of data products, originally a gridded reconstruction of land surface air temperature records spanning 1701-present, and now including an 1850-present merged land-ocean data set that combines the land analysis with an interpolated...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Climatology,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Global Temperature Data Sets: Overview & Comparison Table
Years of Record: 1850/01 to 2013/10
Global surface temperature data sets are an essential resource for monitoring and understanding climate variability and climate change. The most commonly used data sets combine historical observations of near surface air temperatures at land stations with global data sets of sea surface...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | binary
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly
Domain: Global
Goddard Satellite-based Surface Turbulent Fluxes Version 2c (GSSTF 2c)
Years of Record: 1987/01 to 2008/12
This data set (GSSTF 2C) has been superceded by GSSTF3 released in July 2012. The Goddard Satellite-based Surface Turbulent Fluxes (GSSTF) data set is part of the NASA Making Earth Science Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) Project. The objective of this project is to...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: binary | HDF-EOS
Timestep: Climatology,Daily,Monthly,Seasonal,Annual
Domain: Global
Goddard Satellite-based Surface Turbulent Fluxes Version 3 (GSSTF3)
Years of Record: 1998/01 to 2008/12
Version 3: The Goddard Satellite-based Surface Turbulent Fluxes (GSSTF) data set is part of the NASA Making Earth Science Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) Project. The objective of this project is to continually produce a uniform data set of sea surface turbulent fluxes...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: HDF-EOS
Timestep: Climatology,Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
GPCC: Global Precipitation Climatology Centre
Years of Record: 1891/01 to 2016/12
The GPCC provides gridded gauge-analysis products derived from quality controlled station data. Two products are for climate: (a) the Full Data Reanalysis Product (1901-2010) is recommended for global and regional water balance studies, calibration/validation of remote sensing based rainfall...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Climatology,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
GPCP (Daily): Global Precipitation Climatology Project
Years of Record: 1996/10 to 2015/11
The 1DD product provides precipitation estimates on a 1-degree grid over the entire globe at 1-day (daily) for the period October 1996 - present. Both the Pentad and 1DD products are consistent with the Version 2 monthly product in the sense that the Pentad and 1DD approximately sum to the monthly...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | binary
Timestep: Daily
Domain: Global
GPCP (Monthly): Global Precipitation Climatology Project
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2015/11
Data from rain gauge stations, satellites, and sounding observations have been merged to estimate monthly rainfall on a 2.5-degree global grid from 1979 to the present. The careful combination of satellite-based rainfall estimates provides the most complete analysis of rainfall available to date...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | binary
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly
Domain: Global
Gridded Climatology of Clouds from Surface Observations Worldwide (1971-2008)
Years of Record: 1954/01 to 2009/12
This digital archive provides multi-year monthly, seasonal, and annual averages in 5x5-degree grid boxes (or 10x10-degree boxes for some quantities over the ocean). Daytime and nighttime averages, as well as the diurnal average (average of day and night), are given. Nighttime averages were computed...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly,Seasonal
Domain: Global
HadEX2: Gridded Temperature and Precipitation Climate Extremes Indices (CLIMDEX data)
Years of Record: 1901/01 to 2010/12
HadEX2 provides gridded, station-based indices of temperature- and precipitation- related climate extremes. It is intended for climate change detection and attribution studies and climate model evaluation. Twenty-nine indices, including daily maximum and minimum temperatures, number of frost days,...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Monthly,Annual
Domain: Global
HadGHCNDEX - Gridded Daily Temperature Extremes
Years of Record: 1950/01 to 2011/12
HadGHCND (aka HadGHCNDEX) is a gridded daily dataset of near-surface maximum (TX) and minimum (TN) temperature observations. Anomalies (departures from 1961-1990 climatology) and actual temperatures are distributed in two separate files. The dataset is designed primarily for the analysis of...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Daily
Domain: Global
HOAPS: Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite Data
Years of Record: 1987/01 to 2008/12
The Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite Data (HOAPS) set is a satellite-based climatology of precipitation, evaporation and freshwater budget (evaporation minus precipitation) as well as related turbulent heat fluxes and atmospheric state variables over the global ice free...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Climatology,Sub-daily,Monthly,Pentad
Domain: Global
Hurrell North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) Index (station-based)
Years of Record: 1865/01 to 2018/04
The winter (December thru March) station-based index of the NAO is based on the difference of normalized sea level pressure (SLP) between Lisbon, Portugal and Stykkisholmur/Reykjavik, Iceland since 1864. Positive values of the NAO index are typically associated with stronger-than-average...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Monthly,Seasonal,Annual
Domain: Atlantic Ocean
IBTrACS: Tropical cyclone best track data
IBTrACS (International Best Track Archive for Climate Stewardship) provides global tropical cyclone best track data in a centralized location to aid our understanding of the distribution, frequency, and intensity of tropical cyclones worldwide. The World Meteorological Organization Tropical Cyclone...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | shapefile
Domain: Global
ICOADS Surface Marine Weather Observations
Years of Record: 1800/01 to 2016/09
ICOADS (International Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set) is the most comprehensive archive of global marine surface climate observations available. Variables include SST, SLP, air temperature, wind speed, cloud amount, and others. There is no processing beyond initial quality control. ICOADS...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | binary | IMMA
Timestep: Climatology,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
ISCCP: International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project
Years of Record: 1983/07 to 2009/12
The International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project (ISCCP) makes use of routine observations by operational weather satellites to provide a long-term (1983-2009), gridded, global record of cloud properties. ISCCP uses observations in the visible and infrared window portions of the spectrum to...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | binary | HDF
Timestep: Climatology,Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
JRA-25
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2004/12
JRA-25 is a second generation reanalysis product. The model and data assimilation are from the operational system in April 2004. It was the first reanalysis to assimilate wind profiles around tropical cyclones deduced from best-track data, resulting in improved tropical cyclone analysis in a global...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
JRA-55
Years of Record: 1957/12 to 2018/07
Spanning 1958-present, JRA-55 is the longest third-generation reanalysis that uses the full observing system (in contrast, products like ERA-20C and NOAA 20CR assimilate a very limited set of observations while NCEP R1 uses an antiquated model and assimilation scheme). Compared to the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Liquid Water Path (LWP): UWisc climatology
Years of Record: 1998/01 to 2008/12
"This work describes a new climatology of cloud liquid water path (LWP), termed the University of Wisconsin (UWisc) climatology, derived from 18 yr of satellite-based passive microwave observations over the global oceans. The climatology is based on a modern retrieval methodology applied...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly
Domain: Global
Liquid Water Path: Overview
Liquid water path (LWP) is one of the most important variables for modeling the atmosphere. LWP is measure of the weight of the liquid water droplets in the atmosphere above a unit surface area on the earth, given in units of kg m−2 (AMS Glossary). It is critical for understanding...
Main variables and Earth System components:
MSU/AMSU Atmospheric Temperature Climate Data Record, Remote Sensing Systems (RSS)
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2012/12
A long (30-year+) data set of atmospheric temperatures for 4 tropopsheric and lower stratopsheric layers has been derived from brightness temperatures measured by the Microwave Sounding Unit (MSU) and Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit (AMSU). This page describes the data sets developed by Remote...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | binary
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
NASA Energy and Water cycle Study (NEWS) Climatology of the 1st Decade of the 21st Century Dataset
Years of Record: 1998/01 to 2010/12
This data set summarizes the original observation-based mean fluxes of Water and Energy Budget (WEB) components during the first decade of the 21st century (specifically: 1998-2010), for each continent and ocean basin. These data are summarized on both monthly and annual scales, as well as...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | Spreadsheet
Timestep: Climatology,Monthly,Annual
Domain: Africa, Antarctic, Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Australia, Europe, Indian Ocean, Maritime Continent, North America, South America
NASA MERRA
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2016/11
The Modern Era Retrospective-Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA) was undertaken by NASA’s Global Modeling and Assimilation Office with two primary objectives: to place observations from NASA’s Earth Observing System satellites into a climate context and to improve upon the hydrologic...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | HDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
NASA's MERRA2 reanalysis
Years of Record: 1980/01 to 2017/11
The Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2) is a global atmospheric reanalysis produced by the NASA Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO). It spans the satellite observing era from 1980 to the present. The goals of MERRA-2 are to provide a...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
NCAR Sea Level Pressure
Years of Record: 1899/01 to 2018/09
NCAR Sea Level Pressure is a gridded analysis of SLP based on land station reports, covering 1899 to present for latitudes 30°N-90°N. Quality controlled raw data plus empirical corrections for changes in instrumentation and station location.
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | binary
Domain: NH - Northern Hemisphere
NCEP NARR
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2018/11
A high resolution (32km x 29 pressure levels) data set focused upon the North American Region. Relative to the NCEP-DOE (R2) it has a much improved land-hydrology, diurnal cycle and land-atmosphere interaction. As such, it can be considered a second generation reanalysis. A unique feature is the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: GRIB
Timestep: Climatology,Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: North America
NCEP Reanalysis (R2)
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2018/11
NCEP-DOE Reanalysis II (R2) is an improved version of the NCEP-NCAR Reanalysis I (R1). The improvements include an updated model with better physical parameterizations, assorted data assimilation errors were fixed and additional data were included. Still, it is still a 'first generation' product.
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
NCEP-NCAR (R1): An Overview
Years of Record: 1948/01 to 2018/11
NCEP-NCAR (R1) is the original reanalysis effort. It uses a frozen global state-of-the-art global data assimilation system (as of 11 January 1995). The original database was enhanced (additional, quality checked datasets) by NCAR's Data Support Section. Originally planned to span 1957-96 ("40-Year...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
NLDAS: North American Land Data Assimilation System
Years of Record: 1980/01 to 2014/12
The goal of the North American Land Data Assimilation System (NLDAS) is to construct quality-controlled, and spatially and temporally consistent, land-surface model (LSM) datasets from the best available observations and model output to support modeling activities. Data sets are available on hourly...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | GRIB
Timestep: Climatology,Sub-daily,Monthly
Domain: North America
NOAA 20th-Century Reanalysis, Version 2 and 2c
Years of Record: 1850/12 to 2014/12
The Twentieth Century Reanalysis (20CR) provides a comprehensive global atmospheric circulation data set spanning 1850-2014. Its chief motivation is to provide an observational validation data set, with quantified uncertainties, for assessing climate model simulations of the 20th century, with...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | GRIB
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
NOAA ThreadEx Long-term Station Extremes for America
Years of Record: 1870/01 to 2011/12
ThreadEx is a data set of extreme daily temperature and precipitation values for 270 locations in the United States. For each day of the year at each station, ThreadEx provides the top 3 record high and low daily maximum temperatures, the top 3 record high and low daily minimum temperatures, the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Daily
Domain: North America
OAFlux: Objectively Analyzed air-sea Fluxes for the global oceans.
Years of Record: 1958/01 to 2012/12
"The OAFlux project aims to provide consistent, multi-decade, global analysis of air-sea heat, freshwater (evaporation), and momentum fluxes for use in studies of global energy budget, water cycle, atmosphere and ocean circulation, and climate. The OAFlux project is so called because it applies...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR): HIRS
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2012/12
"The new Climate Data Record (CDR) provides daily global climate data that are valuable as inputs into Radiation Budget Studies and verifying numerical models and can identify the variations in tropical clouds and rainfall that drive global weather patterns. The daily climate data of OLR can...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR): AVHRR
Years of Record: 1974/06 to 2013/12
OLR (Outgoing Longwave Radiation) is a measure of the amount of energy emitted to space by earth's surface, oceans and atmosphere. As such, it is a critical component of the earth's radiation budget. In a different context, OLR values are often used as a proxy for convection in tropical and...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Climatology,Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Overview: Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Data Sets
Years of Record: 1958/01 to 2012/09
Directly measured and continuous records of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) extend back to 1958. CO2 has also been measured in ancient air samples trapped in ice cores, and these records extend back hundreds of thousands of years. More recently, CO2 is being sampled by satellites providing global...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Daily,Monthly,Annual
Overview: Climate Indices
A climate index is a simple diagnostic quantity that is used to characterize an aspect of a geophysical system such as a circulation pattern. A variety of methods have been used to derive assorted indices. Classically, selected station, grid point or regional average data have been used (eg.,...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Precipitation Data Sets: Overview & Comparison table
Precipitation (rain, snow, hail, ...) is one of the key components of the hydrological cycle. Its societal importance cannot be over stated. For climate research, precipitation is one of the key terms for balancing the energy budget, and one of the most challenging aspects of climate modeling....
Main variables and Earth System components:
Precipitation Reconstruction Land (PREC/L): 1948-present
Years of Record: 1948/01 to 2018/08
Precipitation gauge measurements over land from the GHCN-v2 (Global Historical Climatology Network version 2) are interpolated onto 3 grids: at 0.5, 1 and 2.5 degree resolutions via optimal interpolation. Note: As of May, 2011 the GHCN version 3 station data set is available.
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | binary
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
QBO: Quasi-Biennial Oscillation
Years of Record: 1953/01 to 2012/09
The quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) is a quasi-periodic oscillation of the equatorial zonal wind between easterlies and westerlies in the tropical stratosphere with a mean period of 28 to 29 months. The alternating wind regimes develop at the top of the lower stratosphere and propagate downwards...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Tropics
QuikSCAT: near sea-surface wind speed and direction
Years of Record: 1999/08 to 2009/10
The QuikSCAT mission was intended to obtain sea-surface wind speed and direction data under all weather and cloud conditions over Earth's oceans. SeaWinds, an active radar scatterometer, is the main instrument on the QuikSCAT satellite. The microwave backscatter measured by SeaWinds is dependent on...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | binary
Timestep: Daily,Monthly,Weekly
Domain: Global
SEVIRI: Cloud Mask Dataset: Very High Resolution
Years of Record: 2004/01 to 2012/12
The SEVIRI cloud mask dataset has been generated and released by the EUMETSAT Satellite Application Facility on Climate Monitoring (CM SAF) to enhance the cloud property dataset CLAAS. The SEVIRI cloud mask dataset contains the cloud mask in 15 minutes temporal resolution. The dataset is pixel...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | HDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Africa, Atlantic Ocean, Europe
Simplistic Overview of Reanalysis Data Assimilation Methods
Data assimilation is the process of combining observations from a wide variety of sources and forecast output from a weather prediction model. The resulting analysis is considered to be the 'best' estimate of the state of the atmosphere at a particular instant in time. The process of combining the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
SSM/I, SSMIS: Special Sensor Microwave/Imager and Sounder
Years of Record: 1987/07 to 2015/06
The SSM/I and SSMIS satellites are operated by the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) and are part of NASA's Pathfinder Program. The instrumentation has been flown on a number of satellites: F-8 (1987), F-10 (November 1990), F-11 (December 1991), F-12 (August 1994), F-13 (March 1995),...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: binary
Timestep: Daily,Monthly,Weekly
Domain: Global
SSMI Version 7: Ocean Product Suite
The Ocean Product Suite (v7) from Remote Sensing Systems (RSS) is available in netCDF (v4) format. The RSS Ocean Product Suite includes numerous data products for the SSMI/SSMIS instruments on the DMSP F08, F10, F11, F13, F14, F15, F17 polar orbiting satellites. These are part of the NASA Making...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI)
Years of Record: 1949/01 to 2018/07
The Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) is a widely used index to characterize meteorological drought on a range of timescales. On short timescales, the SPI is closely related to soil moisture, while at longer timescales, the SPI can be related to groundwater and reservoir storage. The SPI can...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Timestep: Monthly
Stratospheric Ozone: Randel & Wu 2007
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2005/12
This is a monthly, zonal-mean ozone profile data set spanning 1979–2005 for altitudes from the tropopause up to 50 km. Interannual variability is based on a combination of SAGE (Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment) satellite profile measurements and polar ozonesondes. The interannual...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: binary
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
Stratospheric Ozone: Vertically Resolved, zonal mean based on BDBP
Years of Record: 1979/01 to 2007/12
Combined monthly mean vertical ozone profile database spanning the period 1979 to 2007. The database is completely filled such that there are no missing data. The raw individual ozone data are sourced from the BDBP database. Monthly means are calculated from individual ozone measurements...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
Surface Flux and Meteorological Dataset: National Oceanography Centre (NOC) V2.0
Years of Record: 1973/01 to 2014/12
The National Oceanography Centre (NOC) Version 2.0 Surface Flux and Meteorological Dataset is a monthly mean gridded dataset of marine surface measurements and derived fluxes constructed using optimal interpolation. Input for the period 1973 to 2006 are ICOADS Release 2.4 ship data and the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
Total Column Ozone: Bodeker Scientific
Bodeker Scientific produces global, daily, total column ozone database by combining measurements from a number of different satellite-based instruments. Offsets and drifts between the different datasets are resolved through comparisons with the Dobson and Brewer ground-based instruments and through...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
Total Solar Irradiance (TSI) datasets: An overview
Years of Record: 1610/01 to 2016/03
The solar radiation arriving at Earth (once known as the “solar constant”, now usually referred to as Total Solar Irradiance (TSI)), is the most fundamental of climate parameters as it indicates the totality of the energy driving the climate system. All climate models need to prescribe a...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Domain: Global
TRMM: Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission
Years of Record: 1998/01 to 2016/10
Note: After 17 years (1997-4/2015) the TRMM mission came to an end. NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) stopped TRMM’s science operations and data collection on April 8, 2015 after the spacecraft depleted its fuel reserves. The Global Precipitation Mission (GPM) is the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | HDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly
Domain: Tropics
Tropical Moored Buoy System: TAO, TRITON, PIRATA, RAMA (TOGA)
Years of Record: 1992/01 to 2013/04
The Tropical Ocean Global Atmosphere program (TOGA) is a component of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) aimed specifically at the prediction of climate phenomena on time scales of months to years. In order to achieve the TOGA goals, a strategy of large-scale, long-term monitoring of the...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily,Monthly,Weekly
Domain: Tropics
U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI)
Years of Record: 1910/01 to 2012/12
The CEI was first presented in 1995 as a framework for quantifying observed changes in climate within the contiguous United States. The index is based on an aggregate set of conventional climate extreme indicators which now includes extremes in land- falling tropical storm and hurricane wind...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: ascii
Timestep: Monthly,Seasonal,Annual
Domain: North America
WASWind: Wave and Anemometer-based Sea Surface Wind
Years of Record: 1950/01 to 2011/12
"WASWind (Wave and Anemometer-based Sea Surface Wind) provides a bias-corrected marine surface wind dataset over the global oceans. Variables include scalar, zonal and meridional winds at 10-meter high, and zonal and meridional components of wind stress. WASWind has been constructed from wind...
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF
Timestep: Monthly
Domain: Global
Water Isotopes from Satellites
Years of Record: 2000/01 to 2012/09
Summary of 7 satellite-derived products providing a global snapshot of water isotope distribution in 3D, with good information on zonal gradients and seasonality.
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: netCDF | ascii | HDF
Timestep: Sub-daily,Daily
Domain: Global
Water Vapor from NVAP
Years of Record: 1988/01 to 2001/12
The NASA Water Vapor Project (NVAP) total column water vapor (aka, precipitable water) data sets comprise a combination of radiosonde observations, Television and Infrared Operational Satellite (TIROS) Operational Vertical Sounders (TOVS), and Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) data sets....
Main variables and Earth System components:
Formats: binary
Timestep: Daily,Monthly
Domain: Global
