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ICDC
CENIntegrated Climate Data Center ICDC

Photo: getty images/L. Calvetti

Long Term Observations

Local Observations (Supersites)

This collection of local observations was created in the HD(CP)2 project to study the structures in and interactions between clouds, aerosols, water vapor and precipitation with a vertical resolution comparable to the HD(CP)² model. The supersites were of particular interest as they allow for high resolution continuous vertical profiling using the best available instrumentation. The aim was to develop the evaluation of the HD(CP)² simulations and the precipitation parameterization for climate models. The continuous collection of standardized, quality-controlled observations, supplemented by various value-added products (VAP), are collected in the archive and optimally suited to derive multi-parameter statistics for the development of parameterization and to study processes such as cloud formation.

Location of Supersites. Lists show all instruments of which data are stored in the achive, as of Jan 2015.
Fig. 1: Location of Supersites. Lists show all instruments of which data are stored in the achive, as of Jan 2015. Copyright: Andrea Lammert

Full Domain

"Full Domain" collects data from measurements that cover large areas. In this submodule of the HD(CP)2 project, the observations from ground-based networks (polarimetric precipitation radars, ceilometers, GPS receivers, etc.) were combined with satellite observations from CloudSat and CALIPSO, from specific sensors on polar orbiting satellites like MERIS and MODIS, and from the geostationary satellite MSG and integrated into the archive. The integration focused both on high temporal resolution data such as the MSG and radar network data, but also on products based on the low frequency temporal sampling achievable from polar orbiting satellites.