EU WATCH - Data Submission

SIXTH FRAMEWORK PROGRAMME

PRIORITY 6.3
Global Change and Ecosystems

Project Duration:
01.02.2007 - 31.01.2011

Data Submission

The files should be uploaded to the Watch ftp server. Please open the folder called "ModelIntercomparison", and put your results in the appropriate subfolder. REMEMBER TO ZIP THE FILES!

Data format

NetCDF is the chosen data format both for the input data and the output data. A good source of documentation on the netCDF format can be found at http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf. The online user manual is filled with example code blocks. Also, Jan Polcher has written and assembled some general software for reading and writing netCDF format (see http://www.lmd.jussieu.fr/~polcher/ALMA/alma_bazar.html).

Data convention

The ALMA data exchange convention, which has been used in e.g. PILPS and GSWP projects, will be used.

Table: Convention for model output data. ALMA convention, see also http://www.lmd.jussieu.fr/~polcher/ALMA

Variable	Description	Definition	Units	Positive dir. (trad.)	Positive dir. (math.)
Precip	Precipitation rate	Average of the total precipitation (rainfall and snowfall) over a time step and grid cell	kg/m²s	Downward	Downward
Snowf	Snowfall	Average of the total snowfall over a time step and grid cell	kg/m²s	Downward	Downward
Evap	Total evapotranspiration	Sum of all evaporation sources, averaged over a grid cell	kg/m²s	Upward	Downward
Qs	Surface runoff	Runoff from the landsurface and/or subsurface stormflow	kg/m²s	Out of gridcell	Into gridcell
Qsb	Subsurface runoff	Gravity drainage and/or slow response lateral flow. Ground water recharge will have the opposite sign.	kg/m²s	Out of gridcell	Into gridcell
Qrec	Recharge to the flood plain	Recharge from river to the flood plain	kg/m²s	Into gridcell	Out of gridcell
SoilMoist	Soil moisture	Soil water content in total user-defined soil layer. Includes the liquid, vapor and solid phases of water in the soil.	kg/m²	-	-
RootMoist	Root zone soil moisture	Total simulated soil moisture available for evapotranspiration	kg/m²	-	-
RootSoilStress	Root zone soil stress	(Simulated root zone soil moisture – Wilting point) / (Critical soil moisture – Wilting point)	-	-	-
SWE	Snow water equivalent	Total water mass of the snowpack (liquid or frozen), averaged over a grid cell.	kg/m²	-	-
SnowFrac	Snow covered fraction	Grid cell snow covered fraction	-	-	-
Dis	Simulated river discharge	Simulated river discharge	m³/s	-	-
ECanop	Interception evaporation	Evaporation from canopy interception, averaged over all vegetation types within a grid cell.	kg/m²s	Upward	Downward
TVeg	Vegetation transpiration	Transpiration from canopy, averaged over all vegetation types within a grid cell	kg/m²s	Upward	Downward
ESoil	Bare soil evaporation	Evaporation from bare soil	kg/m²s	Upward	Downward
EWater	Open water evaporation	Evaporation from surface water storage	kg/m²s	Upward	Downward
ESSNow	Snow evaporation and sublimation	Total sublimation and evaporation from the snow pack	kg/m²s	Upward	Downward
SurfStor	Surface water storage	Total liquid water storage, other than soil, snow or interception storage (i.e. lakes, river channel or depression storage).	kg/m²	-	-
GroundMoist	Groundwater	Total ground water content	kg/m²	-	-
PotEvap	Potential evapotranspiration	The flux as computed for evapotranspiration but will all resistances set to zero, except the aerodynamic resistance.	kg/m²s	Upward	Downward
Qst	Snow throughfall	Liquid water flowing out of the snow pack	kg/m²s	-	-
Albedo	Surface albedo	Grid cell average albedo for all wavelengths	-	-	-
SAlbedo	Snow albedo	Albedo of the snow-covered surface, averaged over the grid cell	-	-	-
WaterTableD	Water table depth	Depth of the water table	m	-	-
SWnet	Net shortwave radiation	Incoming solar radiation less the simulated outgoing shortwave radiation, averaged over a grid cell	W/m²	Downward	Downward
LWnet	Net longwave radiation	Incident longwave radiation less the simulated outgoing longwave radiation, averaged over a grid cell	W/m²	Downward	Downward
Qle	Latent heat	Energy of evaporation, averaged over a grid cell	W/m²	Upward	Downward
Qh	Sensible heat	Sensible energy, averaged over a grid cell	W/m²	Upward	Downward
Qg	Ground heat	Heat flux into the ground, averaged over a grid cell	W/m²	Downward	Upward
SurfHeat	Surface heat storage

File naming convention and array structure

One file should include only one variable when submitting the data. Use only lowercase letters in the file names, since some netCDF viewers only accept lowercase letters in their filenames. The submitted time series of monthly and daily data should use the following file naming convention, where VariableName refers to the variable names used in the ALMA convention:

· ModelName_nccforcings_VariableName_monthly_1985_1999.nc, e.g. gwava_nccforcings_evap_monthly_1985_1999.nc

· ModelName_nccforcings_VariableName_daily_1987_1988.nc, e.g. gwava_nccforcings_evap_daily_1987_1988.nc

The gridded fields of water state variables at the beginning and the end of the reporting period, in addition to gridded fields of LAI, soil depth and rooting depth, should follow the following file naming convention:

· ModelName_nccforcings_StateName_ini.nc, e.g. gwava_nccforcings_soilmoist_ini.nc

· ModelName_nccforcings_StateName_end.nc, e.g. gwava_nccforcings_soilmoist_end.nc

· ModelName_nccforcings_VegOrSoilparameter.nc, e.g. gwava_nccforcings_lai.nc

Data are to be submitted for the area -56 to 84 degrees latitude, and from -180 to 180 degrees longitude, i.e. 280 rows and 720 cols, or 201600 grid cells totally. Write the outputs row-wise starting at -55.75 and -179.75, and ending at 83.75 and 179.75.

Naming convention in netCDF:

x-dimension name: lon

x-dimension units: degrees_east

y-dimension name: lat

y-dimension units: degrees_north

t-dimension name: time

t-dimension units: months since 1985-01-01 00:00:00 (or days since 1987-01-01 00:00:00 for the daily fields. Months should refer to calendar months, and not year/12 which is sometimes used).

missing_value: 1.e+20f

Example of naming of variables:

Long field name: Total evapotranspiration

Short field name: Evap (Use the ALMA variable names)

Field units: kg/m²s (Use the ALMA variable units)

The size of one output file including one variable at monthly time steps for a 15 year period is about 138 MB (netcdf format, uncompressed). Zip-compressed the file size is less than 10 percent of the uncompressed file size. The size of one output file including one variable at daily time steps for a 2 year period is over 500 MB uncompressed.

The files are to be submitted in compressed formats. Please use the Linux/UNIX compress or gzip (GNU zip) to compress the output files. For those using Windows, WinZip is also acceptable.

The files should be uploaded to the Watch ftp server. Please open the folder called "ModelIntercomparison", and put your results in the appropriate subfolder. REMEMBER TO ZIP THE FILES!