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Gridded Data Sources
The tables below identify some of the gridded hydrologic data sources that can been used to inform hydrologic modeling. Entries are typically free to the public, have daily or sub-daily time steps, and less than 10 km spatial resolution. User contributions to the table are welcome. If you would like to suggest an update or addition to the table, please email the HMS inbox: hec.hms@usace.army.mil.
Historical Data
Name | Variables | Source | Domain | Period of Record | Timestep | Resolution | Format | Archive |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Multi-Radar Multi-Sensor Quantitative Precipitation Estimate (MRMS QPE) | Precipitation | NOAA National Severe Storms Laboratory | CONUS (separate sectors for Alaska, Hawaiʻi, Caribbean, Guam) | 2012 - present | 1 hr | 1 km | GRIB | IA State Mesonet (2015-present) AWS S3 – HAWAII sector NCEI Orders (2020-present) |
| Real-time Mesoscale Analysis (RTMA) | Precipitation, Temperature, et al. | NOAA National Centers for Environmental Prediction | North America | 2006 - present | 1 hr | 2.5 km | GRIB | IA State Mesonet (2012-present) |
| Parameter-elevation Regressions on Independent Slopes Model (PRISM) | Precipitation, Temperature, et al. | Oregon State University, USDA, NOAA | North America | 1895 - present | 1 day | 4 km, 800 m (for fee) | ASCII, BIL | PRISM Climate Group |
| Next-generation Radar Quantitative Precipitation Estimate (NEXRAD QPE) | Precipitation | NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information | CONUS | 2002 - 2011 | 5 min | 1 km | NetCDF | NCEI Orders |
| NOAA National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Stage IV Data | Precipitation | NOAA NCEP | CONUS | 2002 - present | 1 hr | 4 km | GRIB | NCAR / EOL |
| Analysis of Period of Record for Calibration (AORC) | Precipitation, Temperature | NOAA Office of Water Prediction | North America | 1979 - present | 1 hr | 4 km | NetCDF | |
| Integrated multi-satellite retrievals for global precipitation measurement (IMERG/GPM) | Precipitation | NASA | Global | 2000 - present | 30 min | 0.1 degree | NetCDF | Also see GES DISC downloader |
| Climate Prediction Center Morphing Technique (CMORPH) | Precipitation | NOAA NCEP | Global | 1998 - present | 30 min, 1 hr, 1 day | 8 km, 0.25 degree | NetCDF | FTP |
| Daymet | Precipitation, Temperature | NASA, ORNL | North America | 1980 - present | 1 day | 1 km | NetCDF | ORNL DAAC |
| Livneh CONUS Near-Surface Gridded Meteorological and Derived Hydrometeorological Data | Precipitation, Temperature, et al. | Livneh B., E.A. Rosenberg, C. Lin, B. Nijssen, V. Mishra, K.M. Andreadis, E.P. Maurer, and D.P. Lettenmaier, 2013: A Long-Term Hydrologically Based Dataset of Land Surface Fluxes and States for the Conterminous United States: Update and Extensions, Journal of Climate, 26, 9384–9392. | CONUS | 1915 - 2011 | 1 day | 0.0625 degree | NetCDF | FTP |
Livneh Unsplit | Precipitation, Temperature, and Wind Speed | David W. Pierce; Lu Su; Daniel R. Cayan; Mark D. Risser; Ben Livneh; Dennis P. Lettenmaier, 2021: An extreme-preserving long-term gridded daily precipitation data set for the conterminous United States Journal of Hydrometeorology, v. 22 p. 1883, https://doi.org/10.1175/JHM-D-20-0212.1 | CONUS | 1915 - 2018 | 1 day | 0.0625 degree | NetCDF | https://cirrus.ucsd.edu/~pierce/nonsplit_precip/ |
| Hawaiʻi Hourly Radar Rainfall (Huang et al. 2022) | Precipitation | Huang, Y.-F., et al., 2022: Hourly rainfall data from rain gauge networks and weather radar up to 2020 across the Hawaiian Islands, Scientific Data 9:334 | Hawai'ian Islands | 2016 - 2020 | 1 hr | 0.005 degree (∼250 m) | NetCDF | Dataset (figshare); Description |
| Topography Weather (TopoWx) | Temperature | University of Montana/Montana Climate Office | CONUS | 1948 - 2016 | 1 day | 800 m | NetCDF | PSU SCRiM |
| Snow Data Assimilation System (SNODAS) | Snow water equivalent, snow depth, et al. | National Snow and Ice Data Center | CONUS | 2003 - present | 1 day | 1 km | DAT | FTP |
| University of Arizona SWE | Snow water equivalent, snow depth | University of Arizona Climate Assessment for the Southwest (CLIMAS) | CONUS | 1982 - present | 1 day | 4 km | NetCDF |
Hypothetical Data
Name | Variables | Source | Domain | Scenarios | Timestep | Resolution | Format | Archive |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ARkStorm 2.0 | Precipitation, Temperature, Wind, CAPE, IVT, et al. | Huang and Swain (2022) | California and adjacent regions | ARkHist and ARkFuture hypothetical scenarios | 1 hr | 3 km | NetCDF | Formatted Data |
Other useful links:
NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory Gridded Climate Datasets: Precipitation