Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (CFSR), for 1979 to 2011

The global land surface model has four4 soil levels and the global sea ice model has 3 layers. The CFSR atmospheric model has observed variations in carbon dioxide (CO2) over the 1979-2009 period, together with changes in aerosols and other trace gases and solar variations. Most available in-situ and satellite observation data were included in the CFSR.

Satellite-based radiance observations were bias corrected with spin-up runs at full resolution, taking into account variable CO2 concentrations. This procedure enabled smooth transitions of the observation record due to evolutionary changes in satellite observing systems. The CFSR atmospheric, oceanic and land surface output products are available at an hourly time resolution and at a 0.5 deg x 0.5 deg latitude and longitude resolution.

In total, there are 10 data products available from the National Climatic Data Center that make up the CFS Reanalysis collection: MON - Monthly Means; TIME - Parameter Timeseries; PGB - 3-D Pressure Level Data; FLX - Surface and Radiative Fluxes; OCN - 3-D Ocean Data; IPV - 3-D Isentropic Level Data; DIAB - 3-D Diabatic Heating Data; GRBLOW - Low-Resolution Data; HIC - High-Res Initial Conditions; LIC - Low-Res Initial Conditions.

All data are in GRIB-2 format, except for the initial condition data which are in native binary formats. Total CFSR data volume is approximately 200 TB.