Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
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Spatial irregularly distributed point data
: e.g. the station measurements and
observations, vertical radio sounding data if some generalization is taken into
account;
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Raster data
: e.g. the different field from weather forecast models or from
climate models;
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Image date
: e.g. satellite data, weather radar data.
Meteorological data can also be classified into scalar data (air temperature) and
vector data (wind with wind speed and wind direction). According to the classical
basic of statistics meteorology/climatology include all types of scales of
measurements:
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Nominal scale
: e.g. cloud type, present weather, weather type;
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Ordinal scale
: e.g. cloud density;
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Interval scale
: e.g. air temperature;
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Ratio scale
: e.g. precipitation, air pressure.
In addition to these statistical or GIS-related classification schemes, there are
also such from meteorology/climatology schemes based on the idea of a Global
Observing System [WMO 08]:
- Surface-based subsystem: comprises a wide variety of types of stations
according to the particular application (e.g. surface synoptic stations, upper-air
stations, climate stations);
- Spaced-based subsystem: comprises a number of spacecraft with on-board
sounding missions and the associated ground segment for command, control and
data reception.
1.1.4.
Access to climate data: spatial data infrastructure in meteorology and
climatology
Since the foundation of the NMS, the weather forecast has been highly
dependent on efficient spatial data infrastructure, which today is called the Global
Telecommunication System (GTS) and covers the entire Earth. Station observations
and other data are shared with GTS worldwide within the hour according to
standardized regulations, in order to get a “snapshot” of the current state of
atmosphere and weather conditions and as an input for weather forecast models. The
GTS data infrastructure is highly standardized and secures the data transfer between
the NMSs, but does not fully meet the needs of the increasing number of users
outside the NMSs' networks. As a result, international NMSs networks, such as
EUMETNET (The Network of European Meteorological Services), established
projects to address this, e.g. UNIDART (uniform data request interface,
http://www.dwd.de/UNIDART). During the last few years, and based on GTS,
WMO initiated the WIS (WMO Information System), which distributes information
globally for real-time weather forecasting and climate monitoring using a service-
oriented architecture.
