13 Available Meteorological Drivers
Meteorological (met) drivers provide the climate forcing data required by ecosystem models in PEcAn. Available drivers include site-level observations, regional and global reanalysis products, and climate model projections.
How to choose a meteorological driver
The appropriate meteorological driver depends on the study scale, site location, and time period of interest.
General guidance:
- Site-level analyses should use flux tower–based datasets (e.g. Ameriflux, Fluxnet, ICOS) when their goal is to precisely match observations from that tower and they are prepared to make analysis-specific choices on how to handle gaps or inconsistencies in the data. Site-level analyses where completeness and timeseries consistency is more important than matching specific days may prefer to use a gridded product.
- Regional analyses commonly use gridded reanalysis or model outputs (such as NARR or NLDAS) whose coverage matches the scale of the analysis.
- Global or long-term analyses typically rely on products with broad spatial and temporal coverage like CRUNCEP, ERA5, or GLDAS.
- Future simulations require climate model outputs (e.g. CMIP5).
Summary of available drivers
| Driver | Scale | Resolution | Coverage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ameriflux | Site | 30–60 min | Varies by site |
| AmerifluxLBL | Site | 30–60 min | Varies by site |
| Fluxnet2015 | Site | 30–60 min | Selected FLUXNET sites |
| FluxnetLaThuile | Site | 30–60 min | Selected FLUXNET sites |
| ICOS Drought 2018 | Site | 30 min | Selected ICOS sites |
| ICOS Ecosystem Archive | Site | 30 min | Selected ICOS sites |
| NARR | Regional (NA) | 3 hr, ~32 km | 1979–present |
| NLDAS | Regional (US) | 1 hr, 0.125° | 1980–present |
| CRUNCEP | Global | 6 hr, 0.5° | 1901–2010 |
| ERA5 | Global | 3 hr, ~31 km | 1950–present |
| GLDAS | Global | 3 hr, 1° | 1948–2010 |
| CMIP5 | Global | 3 hr | 2006–2100 |
| PalEON | Regional | 6 hr, 0.5° | 850–2010 |
| Geostreams | Site | Varies | Varies |