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NOAA merged land air and sea surface temperature dataset

Note: Dataset has again been changed due to changes at source and should be recopied if you acquired before June 9 2011. See NCDC.

 

Brief Description:

  • NOAA merged land air and sea surface temperature dataset

Temporal Coverage:

  • Monthly anomalies and statistics from 1880/01 to present

Spatial Coverage:

  • 5.0 degree latitude x 5.0 degree longitude global grid (72x36).
  • 87.5S - 87.5N, -177.5E - 177.5E.5E.

Levels:

  • Surface

Update Schedule:

  • Monthly (merged)
  • Static (unadjusted,adjusted)

Download/Plot Data:

Archive parameters: File names are composed of variable abbreviations and statistic name:

(variable).(time).(statistic).nc

Variable Statistic Level Download File Create Plot/Subset
Air Temperature Anomaly Surface air.mon.anom.merge.nc plot
(OLD) Air Temperature Anomaly ("Unadjusted") Surface air.mon.anom.nc
Land Mask Mean Surface lsmask.nc

Usage Restrictions:

  • None

Detailed Description:

  • The merged land air and sea surface temperature anomaly analysis is based on data from the Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) of land temperatures and the International Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set (ICOADS) of Sea Surface Temperature (SST) data. Temperature anomalies with respect to 1961-1990 are analyzed separately. The analyzed monthly temperature anomalies are then merged to form the global analysis. More dataset information can be found at NCDC's Global Surface Temperature Anomaly webpage. This is the dataset NOAA uses for global temperature monitoring.

     

    The data has been changed. See the NCDC doc more for details. Basically, Land surface temperatures are available from the Global Historical Climate Network (GHCN). Sea surface temperatures are determined using the extended reconstructed sea surface temperature (ERSST) analysis. ERSST uses the most recently available International Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set (ICOADS) and statistical methods that allow stable reconstruction using sparse data. The monthly analysis begins January 1854, but due to very sparse data, no global averages are computed before 1880. With more observations after 1880, the signal is stronger and more consistent over time. The ERSST version is now 3b. A lsmask.ncland mask is available which contains the fraction of land area.
  • Related Datasets

Caveats:

  • None

Related File Naming & Structure Information:

File Names:

  • var.time.stat.nc   (In directory: /Datasets/noaamergedtemp/ and ./unadj/)

Dataset Format and Size:

  • PSD standard NetCDF ~16 Mbyte file for each monthly file.

Missing Data:

  • -9.96921e+36f.

Citation:

  • Please note: If you acquire NOAA Merged Air Land and SST Anomalies data products from PSD, we ask that you acknowledge us in your use of the data. This may be done by including text such as NOAA Merged Air Land and SST Anomalies data provided by the NOAA/OAR/ESRL PSD, Boulder, Colorado, USA, from their Web site at http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/ in any documents or publications using these data. We would also appreciate receiving a copy of the relevant publications. This will help PSD to justify keeping the NOAA Merged Air Land and SST Anomalies data set freely available online in the future. Thank you!

References:

  • Smith, T. M., et al. (2008), Improvements to NOAA's Historical Merged Land-Ocean Surface Temperature Analysis (1880-2006), J. Climate, 21, 2283-2293.
  • Quayle, R.G., T.C. Peterson, A.N. Basist, and C.S. Godfrey, 1999: An operational near-real-time global temperature index. Geophys. Res. Lett.. 26, 3 (Feb. 1, 1999), 333-335.
  • Smith, T. M., and R. W. Reynolds (2004), Improved extended reconstruction of SST (1854-1997), J. Climate, 17, 2466-2477.
  • Smith, T. M., and R. W. Reynolds (2005), A global merged land air and sea surface temperature reconstruction based on historical observations (1880-1997), J. Climate, 18, 2021-2036.
  • Smith, T. M., et al. (2008), Improvements to NOAA's Historical Merged Land-Ocean Surface Temperature Analysis (1880-2006), J. Climate, 21, 2283-2293.

Original Source:

Contact:

  • Physical Sciences Division: Data Management
    NOAA/ESRL/PSD
    325 Broadway
    Boulder, CO 80305-3328
    esrl.psd.data@noaa.gov