Detailed Specifications
Data dimensions and options
The data span North America at a resolution of 36km (approximately 0.3°). The domain is centered at 38.3°N, 99.6°W, with a grid dimension of 130 x 200 points
Hourly data are available for a past (1980-1999) and future (2080-2099) time period.
Shade (%): 0, 25, 50, 75, 100 Height or depth (m): 0.03, 0.06, 0.09, 0.12, 0.15, 0.18, 0.21, 0.24, 0.27, 0.30, 0.48, 0.66, 0.84, 1.02, 1.20, 1.38, 1.56, 1.74, 1.92
Data is available at intervals of 1hr, 6hrs, 12hrs, daily, monthly, or yearly. Users can select among the following aggregation metrics across time: instantaneous, max, min, mean. We use the following conventions for time aggregation:
- For 6-hr data, the segments of time are 1-6, 7-12, 13-18, 19-00 hrs
- For 12-hr data, the segments of time are 1-12, 13-00 hrs
- A day begins in hour=1 and ends in hour=0 of the next day.
- For monthly data, a month begins in day 1 1:00am and ends at the zero hour of the next month.
- Instantaneous values are at the beginning of a segment.
Variable specifications
The available variables correspond to those of the Weather Research & Forecasting (WRF) model and the additional microclimate model. Additional details are provided in Levy et al. (2016). All variables include a time dimension and some variables include additional dimensions of height or depth above or below the surface and shade level.
| # | Variable | Description | Units | Dimensions | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ALBEDO | surface albedo | dec. % | time | WRF |
| 2 | BGAP | gap between canopies (the fraction of area where visible solar radiation can reach the ground) | dec. % | time | WRF |
| 3 | FVEG | fraction of green vegetation | dec. % | time | WRF |
| 4 | GLW | downward flux of near-infrared radiation | W m-2 | time | WRF |
| 5 | ISNOW | number of snow layers | time | WRF | |
| 6 | SWDOWN | downward flux of visible radiation | W m-2 | time | WRF |
| 7 | TAH | air temperature in canopy | K | time | WRF |
| 8 | Tair | air temperature | K | time, shade, height | Microclimate |
| 9 | Tsurface | surface temperature | K | time, shade | Microclimate |
| 10 | Tsoil | soil/snow temperature | K | time, shade, depth | Microclimate |
| 11 | TV | temperature of a leaf in the vegetation | K | time | WRF |
| 12 | UV | wind velocity | m s-1 | time, height | Microclimate |
| 13 | WGAP | gap within the canopy (the fraction of visible solar radiation that can reach the ground through the canopy) | dec. % | time | WRF |
| 14 | TG | temperature of bulk ground | K | time | WRF |
| 15 | T2 | temperature above bare surface (2-m height) | K | time | WRF |
| 16 | QAIR | specific humidity at surface (2-m height) | kg kg-1 | time | WRF |
| 17 | SMOIS | soil water | m3/m3 | time, height | WRF |
Output specifications
We are currently serving the microclimate data in either NetCDF or CSV format. We use the following naming convention for output:
[varname]_[shade]_[height/depth]_[interval]_[aggregation]_[startdate]_[enddate]_[creation time].[nc/csv] Shade and height/depth are added to the file name only if they are part of the dimensions of the selected variable. The selection parameters are also included as global attributes in each output NetCDF file and as header information for each csv file. Output csv files have three fixed fields namely ‘datetime’ (format YYYYMMDDHH), ‘lat’(latitude) and ‘lon’(longitude) , and a column for each variable selected. The netCDF file is a compressed format that has the same information as CSV divided into variables, dimensions and attributes. The variables are the selected variables, and dimensions contain spatio-temporal information.