Precipitation
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Precipitation, either liquid or solid, is the most important climate variable directly affecting humans. Through either its duration, intensity and frequency or its lack of occurrence, it influences the supply of water, causes risks to life and livelihoods when associated with floods, landslides and droughts, and affects infrastructure planning, leisure activities and more. Precipitation is closely related to cloud properties, a number of terrestrial ECVs and to ocean-surface salinity. It is indicative of the release of latent heat within the energy cycle, as well as being at the heart of the hydrological cycle. |
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| Domain: | Atmosphere | |
| Subdomain: | Surface | |
| Scientific Area: | Hydrosphere | |
| ECV Steward: | ||
| Products: | Accumulated precipitation | |
Precipitation Climatology
Figure: Annual global climatology of accumulated solid and liquid precipitation in mm based on data of the Global Precipitation Climatology Centre (GPCC). |
ECV Products and Requirements
These products and requirements reflect the Implementation Plan 2022 (GCOS-244).
The requirements are found in the complete 2022 ECVs Requirements document as well: ECV Precipitation.
| Products | Accumulated Precipitation | ||
| (*) | Unit | Values | |
| Horizontal Resolution | G | km | 50 |
| B | 125 | ||
| T | 250 | ||
| Vertical Resolution | G | - | |
| B | - | ||
| T | - | ||
| Temporal Resolution | G | d | 1 |
| B | 30 | ||
| T | 365 | ||
| Timeliness | G | d | 1 |
| B | 7 | ||
| T | 30 | ||
| Required Measurement Uncertainty (2-sigma) | G | mm | 1 |
| B | 2 | ||
| T | 5 | ||
| Stability | G | mm/ decade | 0.02 |
| B | 0.05 | ||
| T | 0.1 |
(*) Goal (G): an ideal requirement above which further improvements are not necessary. Breakthrough (B): an intermediate level between threshold and goal which, if achieved, would result in a significant improvement for the targeted application. The breakthrough value may also indicate the level at which specified uses within climate monitoring become possible. It may be appropriate to have different breakthrough values for different uses. Threshold (T): the minimum requirement to be met to ensure that data are useful
Data Sources
This list provides sources for openly accessible data sets with worldwide coverage for which metadata is available. It is curated by the respective GCOS ECV Steward(s). The list does not claim to be complete. Anyone with a suitable dataset who wishes it to be added to this list should contact the GCOS Secretariat.
Gridded In Situ:
- Global Precipitation Climatology Centre (GPCC)
- Climate Prediction Center Merged Analysis of Precipitation (CMAP)
In Situ:
- Integrated Surface Database (ISD) of the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
- Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) of the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Reanalysis:
- REANALYSES.ORG (Inventory for Reanalysis)
Satellite:
- Satellite ECV Inventory by the CEOS/CGMS Working Group on Climate (WGClimate)
