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NOAA Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature (SST) V5

Values from 2008-2018 have chaned at the source. We are changing our data updates to update older values instead of just appending values each month (as of 2020/03/23).

Brief Description: A global monthly SST analysis from 1854 to the present derived from ICOADS data with missing data filled in by statistical methods. More Details... Temporal Coverage: Monthly values for 1854/01 - present. Long term monthly means, derived from data for years 1981 - 2010. Spatial Coverage: 2.0 degree latitude x 2.0 degree longitude global grid (89x180). 88.0N - 88.0S, 0.0E - 358.0E.

Levels:

• Sea Surface

Update Schedule:

• Variable

Download/Plot Data: (FTP Access)

Variable	Statistic	Level	Units	Download File	Create Plot/Subset
Sea Surface Temperature	Monthly Mean	Surface	degC	sst.mnmean.nc
Sea Surface Temperature	Monthly Long Term Mean	Surface	degC	sst.mon.ltm.1981-2010.nc

Usage Restrictions:

• None

Detailed Description:

• The Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature (ERSST) dataset is a global monthly sea surface temperature dataset derived from the International Comprehensive Ocean–Atmosphere Dataset (ICOADS). Production of the ERSST is on a 2° × 2° grid with spatial completeness enhanced using statistical methods. This monthly analysis begins in January 1854 continuing to the present and includes anomalies computed with respect to a 1971–2000 monthly climatology. The newest version of ERSST, version 5, uses new data sets from ICOADS Release 3.0 (Sea Surface Temperatures) SST; SST comes from Argo floats above 5 meters, Hadley Centre Ice-SST version 2 (HadISST2) ice concentration. ERSSTv5 has improved SST spatial and temporal variability by (a) reducing spatial filtering in training the reconstruction functions Empirical Orthogonal Teleconnections (EOTs), (b) removing high-latitude damping in EOTs, and (c) adding 10 more EOTs in the Arctic. ERSSTv5 improved absolute SST by switching from using Nighttime Marine Air Temperature (NMAT) as a reference to buoy-SST as a reference in correcting ship SST biases. Scientists have further improved ERSSTv5 by using unadjusted First-Guess instead of adjusted First-Guess.
  The monthly analysis extends from January 1854 to the present, but because of sparse data in the early years, there is damping of the analyzed signal before 1880. After 1880, the strength of the signal is more consistent over time. ERSST is suitable for long-term global and basin-wide studies, and smoothed local and short-term variations are used in the dataset.
  For more information see https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access/marineocean-data/extended-reconstructed-sea-surface-temperature-ersst-v5.

Caveats:

• The monthly analysis extends from January 1854 to the present, but because of sparse data in the early years, there is damping of the analyzed signal before 1880. After 1880, the strength of the signal is more consistent over time. ERSST is suitable for long-term global and basin-wide studies, and smoothed local and short-term variations are used in the dataset.

Related File Naming & Structure Information:

File Names:

• sst.stat[.time].v5.nc   (In directory: /Datasets/noaa.ersst.v5/)

OpenDap File Names:

• /thredds/dodsC/Datasets/noaa.ersst.v5/sst.mnmean.nc   
• /thredds/dodsC/Datasets/noaa.ersst.v5/sst.mon.ltm.1981-2010.nc   

Dataset Format and Size:

• PSL standard NetCDF4 ~60 Mbyte file for the monthly file.
• PSL standard NetCDF4 1 Mbyte file for each long term mean file.

Missing Data:

• Land points are flagged with a value of -9.96921e+36.

Citation:

• To cite use of dataset: Boyin Huang, Peter W. Thorne, Viva F. Banzon, Tim Boyer, Gennady Chepurin, Jay H. Lawrimore, Matthew J. Menne, Thomas M. Smith, Russell S. Vose, and Huai-Min Zhang (2017): NOAA Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature (ERSST), Version 5. [indicate subset used]. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information. doi:10.7289/V5T72FNM [access date].
• Please note: If you acquire NOAA_ERSST_V5 data products from PSL, we ask that you acknowledge us in your use of the data. This may be done by including text such as NOAA_ERSST_V5 data provided by the NOAA/OAR/ESRL PSL, Boulder, Colorado, USA, from their Web site at / in any documents or publications using these data. We would also appreciate receiving a copy of the relevant publications. This will help PSL to justify keeping the NOAA_ERSST_V5 data set freely available online in the future. Thank you!

References:

• Huang, B., Peter W. Thorne, et. al, 2017: Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature version 5 (ERSSTv5), Upgrades, validations, and intercomparisons. /Journal of Climate,/doi: 10.1175/JCLI-D-16-0836.1
• Huang, B., V.F. Banzon, E. Freeman, J. Lawrimore, W. Liu, T.C. Peterson, T.M. Smith, P.W. Thorne, S.D. Woodruff, and H.-M. Zhang, 2014: Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature version 4 (ERSST.v4): Part I. Upgrades and intercomparisons. Journal of Climate, 28, 911–930, doi:10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00006.1 (link is external).
• Liu, W., B. Huang, P.W. Thorne, et. al, 2014: Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature version 4 (ERSST.v4): Part II. Parametric and structural uncertainty estimations. Journal of Climate, 28, 931–951, doi:10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00007.1 (link is external).
• Huang, B., P. Thorne, T. Smith, et. al, 2015: Further Exploring and Quantifying Uncertainties for Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature (ERSST) Version 4 (v4). Journal of Climate, 29, 3119–3142, doi:10.1175/JCLI-D-15-0430.1 (link is external).

Original Source:

• NCEI ERSST V5.
• https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/ersst/v5/netcdf/
• NOAA NCEI: Boyin Huang. boyin.huang@noaa.gov

Contact:

• Physical Sciences Laboratory: Data Management
  NOAA/ESRL/PSL
  325 Broadway
  Boulder, CO 80305-3328
  psl.data@noaa.gov