Climate Normal Fields Data for World Ocean Atlas

Climate Normal Fields Data application contains objectively analyzed and statistical data generated for the 1991 - 2020 climate normal period from the World Ocean Atlas 2023. The Data Fields are presented in Climate-Forecast (CF) compliant netCDF files. Native ASCII, comma separated value (CSV), and ArcGIS compatibile (shapefiles) formats are also available.

Climate normals, defined as 30-year averages of data by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), provide long-term means for initializing models, environmental studies, checking in situ observations, etc.

Comparing new observations to the most recent climate normal allows one to assess whether or not current observations are within the statistical norm in the context of the most recent 30-year climatological background. Additional applications, such as initializing boundary conditions for climate models or assessing remotely sensed observations, also require a more recent climatology.

For any questions about this product, please e-mail OCLhelp desk.