Obs4MIPs using NOAA's Climate Data Records

Observations for Model Intercomparison Projects (Obs4MIPs) provide well-documented and standardized observational datasets for comparison with output from the 5th phase of the World Climate Research Programme's (WCRP) Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) climate model simulations and analysis. These datasets adhere to CMIP5 requirements with respect to the selected climate variables, format (netCDF), and spatial and temporal resolutions. The required “Technical Note” documentation for Obs4MIPs datasets is valuable in providing data origin description, instrumentation overview, uncertainty estimates, and caveats for usage. Obs4MIPs began as a NASA-led initiative; however, it was recently broadened to include the larger scientific community since its adoption by the WCRP Data Advisory Council as a key international activity. The Optimum Interpolation Surface Sea Temperature (OISST) and Daily Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR) Climate Data Records (CDRs) were selected by NOAA's CDR Program to be utilized by Obs4MIPs. These CDRs provide two important standardized datasets with adequate periods of record (more than 30 years) that may be used for accurate comparison with model simulations and analysis.