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CPC Soil Moisture

Note: data has been converted to netCDF4-classic format from netCDF3

One-Line Description:

  • CPC Soil Moisture (V2).

Temporal Coverage:

  • Monthly Means: 1948/01 through 2017/04 .
  • Long term monthly means, derived from data for years 1981 - 2010.

Spatial Coverage:

  • 0.5 degree latitude x 0.5 degree longitude global grid (720x360).
  • 89.75N - 89.75S, 0.25E - 359.75E.

Levels:

  • N/A

Update Schedule:

  • Monthly

Download/Plot Data:

Variable Statistic Level Download File Create Plot/Subset
Soil Moisture Monthly Mean Surface soilw.mon.mean.v2.nc plot image
Soil Moisture Monthly Long Term Mean Surface soilw.mon.ltm.v2.nc plot image

Usage Restrictions:

  • None

Detailed Description:

  • The monthly data set consists of a file containing monthly averaged soil moisture water height equivalents. Note that data is model-calculated and not measured directly. The dataset is now V2. There are some differences with the previous version, particularly over Africa. The V2 version also has the landmask applied to the datavalues.

Caveats:

  • None

Related File Naming & Structure Information:

File Names:

  • var.time.stat.nc   (In directory: /Datasets/cpcsoil/)

OpenDap File Names:

  • http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/thredds/dodsC/Datasets/cpcsoil/var.time.stat.nc   

Dataset Format and Size:

    Dataset format and size:
  • PSD standard NetCDF4 207 Mbyte file for monthly file.
  • PSD standard NetCDF4 3 Mbyte file for long term monthly mean file.
  • PSD standard NetCDF3 1 Mbyte file for land percentage file.
  • PSD standard NetCDF3 1 Mbyte file for land mask.

Missing Data:

  • There is no missing data though the ocean has 0's. There is a file with the percent of the grid that is land. Another file has simply 1 and 0's for land/ocean. Grids where the percent of land is zero are "missing".

Citation:

  • Performance and Analysis of the constructed analogue method applied to US soil moisture applied over 1981-2001. Huug van den Dool, Jin Huang and Yun Fan, J. of Geophysical Research, vol. 108, 2003, p 1-16.
  • Please note: If you acquire CPC Soil Moisture 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 CPC Soil Moisture 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 CPC Soil Moisture data set freely available online in the future. Thank you!

References:

  • "Analysis of Model-Calculated Soil Moisture over the United States (1931-93) and Application to Long-Range Temperature Forecasts" Jin Huang, Huug van den Dool, and Konstantine P. Georgakakos -- from "Journal of Climate, Vol.9, No.6, June 1996"
  • Performance and Analysis of the constructed analogue method applied to US soil moisture applied over 1981-2001. Huug van den Dool, Jin Huang and Yun Fan, J. of Geophysical Research, vol. 108, 2003, p 1-16.
  • Climate Prediction Center global monthly soil moisture data set at 0.5 degree resolution for 1948 to present. Yun Fan, and Huug van den Dool, J. of Geophysical Research, vol. 109, 2004, D10102, doi:10.1029/2003JD004345.

Original Source:

Contact:

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