Lightning

Lightning is one of the most dramatic weather phenomena, causing many fatalities as well as substantial loss and damage for example by forest fires, damage to electrical infrastructure and other sectors every year all over the world. On top, even more damage is caused by the storms which generate lightning. This direct link to convection makes lightning also a potentially valuable indicator to track and understand trends in storminess, particularly under climate variability and change. In addition, lightning itself impacts the global climate by producing nitrogen oxides (NOX), a strong greenhouse gas.

Global Lightning Distribution

Figure: Number of lightning strokes accumulated for the years 2008–2017, presented as strokes per year per square kilometer on a 0.1° × 0.1° global grid.

Source: Data are from the World Wide Lightning Location Network, and the map is an upgrade of the 0.25° × 0.25° global climatology published by Virts et al. [2013].

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 Lightning.

Products			Schumann Resonances		Total lightning stroke density
	*()**	Unit	Values	Unit	Values
Horizontal Resolution	G		-	Degree pixels	0.1x0.1
	B		-		0.25x0.25
	T		-		1x1
Vertical Resolution	G		-		-
	B		-		-
	T		-		-
Temporal Resolution	G	d	1/24	d	1/24
	B		1		1
	T		30		30
Timeliness	G	d	1	d	10
	B		-		30
	T		30		365
Required Measurement Uncertainty (2-sigma)	G	fT² Hz^-1	1	dimensionless	1
	B		-		-
	T		5		15
Stability	G	fT² Hz^-1/ decade	1	%	1
	B		-		-
	T		5		10

(*) 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 abombelliwmo [dot] int (GCOS Secretariat).

Gridded In Situ Data:

World Wide Lightning Location Network (WWLLN)

Domain:

Atmosphere

Subdomain:

Upper Atmosphere

Scientific Area:

Physical Properties

ECV Steward:

Products:

Schumann Resonances, Total lightning stroke density