Daily and sub-daily hydrometeorological and soil data (2013-2019) [COSMOS-UK]

https://doi.org/10.5285/b5c190e4-e35d-40ea-8fbe-598da03a1185

THIS DATASET HAS BEEN SUPERSEDED The latest version is Daily and sub-daily hydrometeorological and soil moisture data (2013-2024) [COSMOS-UK]

Additional years of data included in a new extended dataset

If you need access to the archived version, please contact the EIDC

This dataset contains daily and sub-daily hydrometeorological and soil observations from COSMOS-UK (cosmic-ray soil moisture) monitoring network from October 2013 to the end of 2019. These data are from 51 sites across the UK recording a range of hydrometeorological and soil variables.

Each site in the network records the following hydrometeorological and soil data at 30 minute resolution: Radiation (short wave, long wave and net), precipitation, atmospheric pressure, air temperature, wind speed and direction, humidity, soil heat flux, and soil temperature and volumetric water content (VWC), measured by point senors at various depths.

Each site hosts a cosmic-ray sensing probe; a novel sensor technology which counts fast neutrons in the surrounding atmosphere. In combination with the recorded hydrometeorological data, neutron counts are used to derive VWC over a field scale (COSMOS VWC), at two temporal resolutions (hourly and daily).
The presence of snow leads to erroneously high measurements of COSMOS VWC due to all the extra water in the surrounding area. Included in the daily data are indications of snow days, on which, the COSMOS VWC are adjusted and the snow water equivalent (SWE) is given.

The potential evapotranspiration (PE), derived from recorded hydrometeorological and soil are also included at daily resolution.

Two levels of quality control are carried out, firstly data is run through a series of automated checks, such as range tests and spike tests, and then all data is manually inspected each week where any other faults are picked up, including sensor faults or connection issues. Quality control flags are provided for all recorded (30 minute) data, indicating the reason for any missing data.

This work was supported by the Natural Environment Research Council award number NE/R016429/1 as part of the UK-SCAPE programme delivering National Capability.

Publication date: 2021-02-09

9 citations

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More information

View numbers valid from 01 June 2023 (information prior to this was not collected)

Format

Comma-separated values (CSV)

Spatial information

Study area

Spatial representation type

Tabular (text)

Spatial reference system

OSGB 1936 / British National Grid

Temporal information

Temporal extent

2013-10-01 to 2019-12-31

Provenance & quality

Hydrometeorological and soil observations are recorded at sites around the UK using an array of sensors. Every hour, the raw data collected is sent to UKCEH in Wallingford, where it is subject to quality control. Soil volumetric water content data are derived from 30 minute hydrometeorological data and data from the cosmic-ray sensing probe by Python scripts run every hour. The data are calculated using the method outlined in Evans et al. (2016, https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.10929). Snow water equivalent are derived by Python scripts at the end of the day from the hydrometeorological data according to Wallbank et al. (2020, https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019EGUGA..2116420W/abstract). Potential evapotranspiration data are derived by Python scripts at the end of the day from the hydrometeorological data according to the Penman-Monteith method (FAO 56, http://www.fao.org/3/X0490E/x0490e00.htm).

All data, that is raw, quality controlled and derived, is saved in an Oracle database.

See supporting documentation for further information.

Licensing and constraints

THIS DATASET HAS BEEN SUPERSEDED The latest version is Daily and sub-daily hydrometeorological and soil moisture data (2013-2024) [COSMOS-UK]

Additional years of data included in a new extended dataset

If you need access to the archived version, please contact the EIDC

This dataset is available under the terms of the Open Government Licence

Cite this dataset as:

Stanley, S.; Antoniou, V.; Askquith-Ellis, A.; Ball, L.A.; Bennett, E.S.; Blake, J.R.; Boorman, D.B.; Brooks, M.; Clarke, M.; Cooper, H.M.; Cowan, N.; Cumming, A.; Evans, J.G.; Farrand, P.; Fry, M.; Hitt, O.E.; Lord, W.D.; Morrison, R.; Nash, G.V.; Rylett, D.; Scarlett, P.M.; Swain, O.D.; Szczykulska, M.; Thornton, J.L.; Trill, E.J.; Warwick, A.C.; Winterbourn, J.B. (2021). Daily and sub-daily hydrometeorological and soil data (2013-2019) [COSMOS-UK]. NERC Environmental Information Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/b5c190e4-e35d-40ea-8fbe-598da03a1185

BibTeX RIS

Services associated with this dataset

Daily soil moisture maps for the UK (2016-2023) at 2 km resolution

Daily estimates for meteorological and potential evapotranspiration variables (CHESS) and soil moisture estimates (JULES) at COSMOS-UK sites, 2013-2017

Citations

Cooper, H. M., Bennett, E., Blake, J., Blyth, E., Boorman, D., Cooper, E., Evans, J., Fry, M., Jenkins, A., Morrison, R., Rylett, D., Stanley, S., Szczykulska, M., Trill, E., Antoniou, V., Askquith-Ellis, A., Ball, L., Brooks, M., Clarke, M. A., … Winterbourn, B. (2021). COSMOS-UK: national soil moisture and hydrometeorology data for environmental science research. In Earth System Science Data (Vol. 13, Issue 4, pp. 1737–1757). Copernicus GmbH. https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-13-1737-2021

Power, D., Rico-Ramirez, M. A., Desilets, S., Desilets, D., & Rosolem, R. (2021). Cosmic-Ray neutron Sensor PYthon tool (crspy 1.2.1): an open-source tool for the processing of cosmic-ray neutron and soil moisture data. In Geoscientific Model Development (Vol. 14, Issue 12, pp. 7287–7307). Copernicus GmbH. https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-7287-2021

Cooper, E., Blyth, E., Cooper, H., Ellis, R., Pinnington, E., & Dadson, S. J. (2021). Using data assimilation to optimize pedotransfer functions using field-scale in situ soil moisture observations. In Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (Vol. 25, Issue 5, pp. 2445–2458). Copernicus GmbH. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2445-2021

Howells, O.D., Petropoulos, G.P., Srivastava, P.K., Triantakonstantis, D., & Sandric, I. (2021). Exploring the potential of SCAT-SAR SWI for soil moisture retrievals at selected COSMOS-UK sites. In International Journal of Remote Sensing (Vol. 42, Issue 23, pp. 9155–9169). Informa UK Limited. https://doi.org/10.1080/01431161.2021.1988185

Maslanka, W., Morrison, K., White, K., Verhoef, A., & Clark, J. (2022). Retrieval of Sub-Kilometric Relative Surface Soil Moisture With Sentinel-1 Utilizing Different Backscatter Normalization Factors. In IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing (Vol. 60, pp. 1–13). Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). https://doi.org/10.1109/tgrs.2022.3175256

Howells, O.D., Petropoulos, G.P., Triantakonstantis, D., Ioannou, Z., Srivastava, P.K., Detsikas, S.E., & Stavroulakis, G. (2023). Examining the variation of soil moisture from cosmic-ray neutron probes footprint: experimental results from a COSMOS-UK site. Environmental Earth Sciences, 82(1) https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-022-10721-1

Liu, C., Shan, Y., Wang, Q., Harris, P., Liu, Y. & Wu, L. (2023) Impacts of measured soil hydraulic conductivity on the space–time simulations of water and nitrogen cycling. CATENA 226, 107058. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2023.107058

Corcoran, E., Afshar, M., Curceac, S., Lashkari, A., Raza, M.M., Ahnert, S., Mead, A., & Morris, R. (2023). Current data and modeling bottlenecks for predicting crop yields in the United Kingdom. In Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems (Vol. 7). Frontiers Media SA. https://doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2023.1023169

Tso, C.-H.M., Blyth, E., Tanguy, M., Levy, P.E., Robinson, E.L., Bell, V., Zha, Y., & Fry, M. (2023). Multiproduct Characterization of Surface Soil Moisture Drydowns in the United Kingdom. In Journal of Hydrometeorology (Vol. 24, Issue 12, pp. 2299–2319). American Meteorological Society. https://doi.org/10.1175/jhm-d-23-0018.1

Supplemental information

COSMOS-UK website

Evans, J.G., Ward, H.C., Blake, J.R., Hewitt, E.J., Morrison, R., Fry, M., Ball, L. A., Doughty, L.C., Libre, J.W., Hitt, O.E., Rylett, D., Ellis, R.J., Warwick, A.C., Brooks, M., Parkes, M.A., Wright, G.M.H., Singer, A.C., Boorman, D.B., & Jenkins, A. (2016). Soil water content in southern England derived from a cosmic-ray soil moisture observing system - COSMOS-UK. In Hydrological Processes (Vol. 30, Issue 26, pp. 4987–4999). Wiley.

https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.10929