3A.2 THE WEATHER AND CLIMATE TOOLKIT Steve Ansari *, Stephen Del Greco NOAA National Climatic Data Center, Asheville, North Carolina Bill Hankins STG Incorporated, Asheville, North Carolina ABSTRACT Custom software must be written to decode or parse the data into formats that common software packages can The Weather and Climate Toolkit (WCT) is free, read. Furthermore, these formats and software platform independent software distributed from NOAA’s packages are different for each major scientific genre National Climatic Data Center (NCDC). The WCT including Engineering, Atmospheric Science, Hydrology allows the visualization and data export of weather and and Environmental Science. By providing conversion climate data, including Radar, Satellite and Model data. and data export tools, easy data access and integration By leveraging the NetCDF for Java library and Common is available to an increased audience. Data Model, the WCT is extremely scalable and capable The Weather and Climate Toolkit is the successor of supporting many new datasets in the future. Gridded to the Java NEXRAD Tools, a successful visualization NetCDF files (regular and irregularly spaced, using and data export tool for NEXRAD Radar data [1]. Climate-Forecast (CF) conventions) are supported, along with many other formats including GRIB, 2. DATA NEXRAD, AREA and GINI [Appendix A]. The WCT is based largely on the Unidata NetCDF The WCT provides tools for custom data overlays, for Java API [4]. The NetCDF for Java API supports the Web Map Service (WMS) background maps, animations direct reading of native formats including GRIB, and basic filtering. The export of images and movies is NEXRAD and HDF into Common Data Model feature provided in multiple formats. The WCT Data Export types such as time series, radial, grid, etc… [Appendix Wizard allows for data export in both vector A]. The WCT provides visualization and data export polygon/point (Shapefile, Well-Known Text) and raster support based on these abstract feature types [6]. (GeoTIFF, ESRI Grid, Gridded NetCDF) formats The current available release provides support for [Appendix B]. These data export features promote the many data formats including: interoperability of weather and climate information with • Gridded NetCDF, HDF and OPeNDAP various scientific communities and common software • GRIB version 1 and 2 packages such as ArcGIS, Google Earth, MatLAB, etc… • NEXRAD Level-II • NEXRAD Level-III The WCT also supports an embedded, integrated • GOES AREA Files Google Earth instance. The Google Earth Browser • GINI Plug-in allows seamless visualization of data on a native • GEMPAK Grids 3-D Google Earth instance linked to the standard 2-D • XMRG MPE map. Additional features include 3D rendering of Radar sweeps in Google Earth through the use of the Users may access data on any remote HTTP or COLLADA modeling technology [Appendix B]. FTP server in addition to local disk. Special support is provided for NCDC HAS orders, CLASS orders and THREDDS catalogs. 1. INTRODUCTION Development is under way to support all feature types and therefore allow integration of any gridded, NCDC archives many diverse datasets including, point, timeseries, swath or radial NetCDF (or readable) but not limited to, station observations, Radar, file into the WCT. Numerical Model, satellite. These data are in many different complicated binary formats and represent 3. SERVICES different abstract data types such as point, time series, grid, radial and swath. While access to the raw datasets Remote data services are supported, providing is relatively easy, integration of the data into user access to data available through web services. Current software and applications is often extremely difficult. data services include the NIDIS U.S. Drought Monitor [3] (Figure 1). Development is under way for the addition of access to the NOAA Severe Weather Data Inventory, * Corresponding author address: NEXRAD Mosaic archive, the National Operational Steve Ansari, 151 Patton Avenue, Asheville, NC 28801; Model Archive and Distribution System (NOMADS), e-mail: [email protected]. NCDC Climate Data Online and multi-sensor analysis software, engineering software and precipitation totals [2, 5]. meteorological analysis tools. Command-line batch processing is supported for all 4. VISUALIZATION data export capabilities. Simple 2D visualization is provided for all supported 6. CONCLUSION datasets. The WCT includes pre-packaged data for common map layers including states, counties and cities The Weather and Climate Toolkit (WCT) provides (Figure 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6). Custom data may be added easier access to NOAA weather and climate datasets. using any NAD83/WGS84 Shapefile. Background maps As free, platform independent, standalone software, the can be added using Web Map Services (WMS) (Figure WCT reaches a large audience of diverse users. By 7). Predefined WMS background maps for USGS providing visualization and export capabilities, users are topographical maps, aerial photography, Landsat, land able to easily integrate the data into their own cover and shaded relief are included. The North applications. The WCT is built upon scalable, open American Datum 1983 (NAD83) lat/long grid is used as source and community-driven NetCDF software which the basis for all visualizations. This allows greater allows for flexible future development. These benefits to interoperability with the Web Map Services. Datasets many user communities exemplify the overall NOAA are remapped for each view extent using a nearest mission. neighbor resampling method if needed. Basic filtering and smoothing functionality is provided. 7. REFERENCES Users may save images to common file formats (such as JPEG, GIF, PNG). KMZ file export allows 1. Ansari, S., and S.A. Del Greco, 2005: GIS Tools for visualization in Google Earth or other virtual globe visualization and analysis of NEXRAD Radar (WSR-88D) software (Figure 8). Animations are supported with Archived Data at the National Climatic Data Center. output in Animated GIF and AVI formats in addition to 85th AMS Annual Meeting, combined preprints CD- KMZ [Appendix B]. ROM, 9-13 January 2005, San Diego CA, 21st Three-dimensional rendering of Radar data is Conference IIPS [International Conference on supported using the COLLADA modeling syntax in Interactive Information and Processing Systems for conjunction with KMZ output in Google Earth (Figure 9) Meteorology, Oceanography, and Hydrology], American [Appendix B]. The rendered data image is draped on a Meteorological Society, Boston, Mass., File J9.6, 9 pp. COLLADA model which represents the surface of the (January 2005). selected beam elevation angle. An internal instance of Google Earth provides an 2. Ansari, S., and S.A. Del Greco, M. Phillips, 2008: A integrated viewing experience linked directly to the geospatial database and climatology for severe weather standard 2-D map (Figure 10). The Google Earth data. 88th AMS Annual Meeting, combined preprints instance is updated following each zoom and pan of the CD-ROM, 21-25 January 2008, New Orleans LA, 24th 2-D map. Conference IIPS [International Conference on Interactive Information and Processing Systems for 5. EXPORT Meteorology, Oceanography, and Hydrology], American Meteorological Society, Boston, Mass., File 5A.10, The WCT supports the export of data to several (January 2008). common scientific formats. Spatial and attribute filtering is provided (Figures 11, 12), allowing users to extract 3. Drought Monitor Website: subsets of the original data. Currently supported export http://drought.unl.edu/dm/monitor.html formats include [Appendix B]: • Point & Polygon Shapefile 4. NetCDF for Java API Website: • Point & Polygon Well-Known Text http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf-java/ • Raw NetCDF (native data structure) • Gridded NetCDF (remapped if needed) 5. NOMADS Website: http://nomads.ncdc.noaa.gov • Arc/Info ASCII Grid • GeoTIFF 6. Unidata Common Data Model tutorial: http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/workshops/ 2008/njcdm/index.html These export formats are readable by many software packages including Geographic Information System (GIS) applications, mathematical and statistical Figure 1. U.S. Drought Monitor Figure 2. NEXRAD Reflectivity Data Figure 3. Smoothed NEXRAD Reflectivity Data Figure 4. GOES Visible Channel Figure 5. GOES Water Vapor Figure 6. Sea Surface Temperature NetCDF / OPeNDAP Figure 7. GOES Infrared with Blue Marble Web Map Service background map Figure 8. GOES Data KMZ output in Google Earth