CHELSA-BIOCLIM+ A novel set of global climate-related predictors at kilometre-resolution

A multitude of physical and biological processes on which ecosystems and human societies depend are governed by climatic conditions. Understanding how these processes are altered by climate change is central to mitigation efforts. Based on mechanistically downscaled climate data, we developed a set of climate-related variables at yet unprecedented spatiotemporal detail as a basis for environmental and ecological analyses. We created gridded data for near-surface relative humidity (hurs), cloud area fraction (clt), near-surface wind speed (sfcWind), vapour pressure deficit (vpd), surface downwelling shortwave radiation (rsds), potential evapotranspiration (pet), climate moisture index (cmi), and site water balance (swb), at a monthly temporal and 30 arcsec spatial resolution globally starting 1980 until 2018. At the same spatial resolution, we further estimated climatological normals of frost change frequency (fcf), snow cover days (scd), potential net primary productivity (npp), growing degree days (gdd), and growing season characteristics for the periods 1981-2010, 2011-2040, 2041-2070, and 2071-2100, considering three shared socioeconomic pathways (SSP126, SSP370, SSP585) and five Earth system models. Time-series variables showed high accuracy when validated against observations from meteorological stations. Climatological normals were also highly correlated to observations although some variables showed notable biases, e.g., snow cover days (scd). Together, the data sets presented here allow improving our understanding of patterns and processes that are governed by climate, including the impact of recent and future climate changes on the world’s ecosystems and associated services to societies.

Funding Information:

This work was supported by:
  • BiodivERsA (link) (Grant/Award: FeedBaCks)
  • Swiss National Science Foundation (link) (Grant/Award: 193907)
  • BiodivERsA (link) (Grant/Award: Futureweb)
  • Swiss National Science Foundation (link) (Grant/Award: 20BD21_184131)
  • WSL (link) (Grant/Award: ClimEx)

Related Datasets

Dirk Nikolaus Karger; Olaf Conrad; Jürgen Böhner; Tobias Kawohl; Holger Kreft; Rodrigo Wilber Soria-Auza; Niklaus E. Zimmermann; H. Peter Linder; Michael Kessler (2021). Climatologies at high resolution for the earth’s land surface areas. EnviDat. doi: 10.16904/envidat.228 Dirk Nikolaus Karger; Niklaus E. Zimmermann (2018). CHELSAcruts - High resolution temperature and precipitation timeseries for the 20th century and beyond. EnviDat. doi: 10.16904/envidat.159 Dirk Nikolaus Karger; Dirk Schmatz; Gabriel Dettling; Niklaus E. Zimmermann (2019). High resolution monthly precipitation and temperature timeseries for the period 2006-2100. EnviDat. doi: 10.16904/envidat.124 Dirk Nikolaus Karger; Michael P. Nobis; Signe Normand; Catherine H. Graham; Niklaus E. Zimmermann (2020). CHELSA-TraCE21k: Downscaled transient temperature and precipitation data since the last glacial maximum. EnviDat. doi: 10.16904/envidat.211 Dirk Nikolaus Karger; Babek Dabaghchian; Stefan Lange; Wilfried Thuiller; Niklaus E. Zimmermann; Catherine H. Graham (2020). High resolution climate data for Europe. EnviDat. doi: 10.16904/envidat.150

Related Publications

Philipp Brun, Niklaus E. Zimmermann, Chantal Hari, Loïc Pellissier, Dirk Nikolaus Karger (submitted) A novel set of global climate-related predictors at kilometre-resolution, Earth System Science Data.

Citation:

Brun, Philipp; Zimmermann, Niklaus E.; Hari, Chantal; Pellissier, Loïc; Karger, Dirk Nikolaus (2022). CHELSA-BIOCLIM+ A novel set of global climate-related predictors at kilometre-resolution. EnviDat. doi:10.16904/envidat.332.

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Data and Resources

Metadata

Field Values
DOI 10.16904/envidat.332
Publication State Published
Authors
  • Email: philipp.brunfoo(at)wsl.ch ORCID: 0000-0002-2750-9793 Given Name: Philipp Family Name: Brun Affiliation: Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL DataCRediT: Validation, Curation, Software, Publication
  • Email: niklaus.zimmermannfoo(at)wsl.ch ORCID: 0000-0003-3099-9604 Given Name: Niklaus E. Family Name: Zimmermann Affiliation: Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL Additional Affiliation : Dep. of Environmental Systems Science, ETH Zurich DataCRediT: Curation, Publication
  • Email: chantal.harifoo(at)wyssacademy.org ORCID: 0000-0003-2507-8747 Given Name: Chantal Family Name: Hari Affiliation: Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL Additional Affiliation : Wyss Academy for Nature Additional Affiliation : Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research DataCRediT: Validation
  • Email: loic.pellissierfoo(at)usys.ethz.ch ORCID: 0000-0002-2289-8259 Given Name: Loïc Family Name: Pellissier Affiliation: Ecosystems and Landscape Evolution, Dep. of Environmental Systems Science, ETH Zurich Additional Affiliation : Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL DataCRediT: Publication
  • Email: dirk.kargerfoo(at)wsl.ch ORCID: 0000-0001-7770-6229 Given Name: Dirk Nikolaus Family Name: Karger Affiliation: Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL DataCRediT: Collection, Validation, Curation, Software, Publication, Supervision
Contact Person Given Name: Philipp Family Name: Brun Email: philipp.brunfoo(at)wsl.ch Affiliation: Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL ORCID: 0000-0002-2750-9793
Subtitles
Publication Publisher: EnviDat Year: 2022
Dates
  • Type: Created Date: 2022-06-13
Version 1.0
Type dataset
General Type Dataset
Language English
Location Global
Content License Creative Commons Zero - No Rights Reserved (CC0 1.0)    [Open Data]
Last Updated September 21, 2022, 09:46 (UTC)
Created June 13, 2022, 09:54 (UTC)