CarbonDioxideInformationAnalysisCenter(CDIAC)

Strategic Plan

Tom Boden

Director

CarbonDioxideInformationAnalysisCenter

Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Oak Ridge, Tennessee37831-6335

August 2004
Table of Contents

Introduction ………………………………………………………………… 3

Strategic Goals ……………………………………………………………… 5

Immediate Actions …………………………………………………………. 8

Present and Future Data Activities ………………………………………..10

Present CDIAC Data Emphasis and Activities …….……………..10

CDIAC Core Data Projects ………………………………………..10

Long-term Climate Observations ………………………....11

Atmospheric Levels of Greenhouse Gases ………………..11

Anthropogenic CO2 Emission Estimates …………………. 12

Project-specific Data Support ……………………………………..13

Oceans ……………………………………………………….13

AmeriFlux …………………………………………………..14

NARSTO …………………………………………………....15

FACE ………………………………………………………..16

Terrestrial Carbon Sequestration …………………………17

Orphaned Data Sets ………………………………………………..17

Coordination and Outreach ……………………………………………….18

Coordination of Data Activities with ARM ………………………18

CDIAC Outreach …………………………………………………..18

Data and Information Request/Response/Records ………………19

CDIAC Computing Infrastructure ……………………………………….19

Summary ……………………………………………………………………20

Introduction

Since 1982, the Climate Change Research Division (CCRD) in DOE’s Office of Science has funded and managed the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. CDIAC’s mission is toprovide information for evaluating complex environmental issues, including potential climate change associated with elevated levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide and other radiatively active trace gases. In the future, CDIAC will continue to provide comprehensive data management services to address the nation’s environmental concerns, help satisfy CCRD’s long-term Climate Change Research measures( and support the data needs of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP). We envision CDIAC serving as a central data provider for the North American Carbon Program (NACP) and its’ regional intensives, providing data streams tailored for data assimilation and “grid” modeling efforts, assembling multi-disciplinary databases necessary for multi-scale synthesis studies, and continuing to add value to data sets essential for climate change research.

CDIAC maintains approximately 300 databases fundamental to climate change research and covering most disciplines engaged in climate change research. Several of the data sets available from CDIAC are truly landmark databases not available anywhere else. Among these landmark databases are the ongoing Mauna Loa atmospheric CO2 record dating back to the late 1950s and CDIAC’s own fossil-fuel CO2 emission time series. To date, CDIAC’s efforts in building a data collection have focused on quantifying components of the global carbon cycle, particularly long-term trends in atmospheric levels of CO2 and anthropogenic releases of CO2 to the atmosphere, providing long-term climate records suitable for detection of a greenhouse-gas induced climate change, and amassing ocean carbonate measurements capable of documenting potential changes in the ocean carbon reservoir.The popularity of CDIAC’s data holdings is evident from the fact CDIAC’s Web site ( receives nearly 600,000 visits annually with annual viewings exceeding 3 million CDIAC Web pages.

CDIAC does more than simply archive data and make them available from a Web site or File Transfer Protocol (FTP) server as the name “InformationAnalysisCenter” implies. CDIAC performs all facets of research data management. CDIAC assembles new databases, analyzes databases and publishes scientific results, compiles metadata, and develops computing tools. CDIAC adds value to data submitted by individual scientists and research programs. CDIAC evaluates the quality of submitted data using a variety of techniques (e.g., standard statistical tests, use by models, intercomparison with related data sets) and interacts with the contributing scientist or program to make corrections or document caveats. CDIAC not only evaluates data but also metadata, including data documentation and important ancillary data sets (e.g., station histories). CDIAC prepares additional documentation, with an aim of satisfying the “20-year test”, when necessary to improve data understanding and widen data applicability. CDIAC reprocesses data to provide data in easy-to-use formats, satisfy modeling requirements, support synthesis exercises, or respond to individual requests. CDIAC develops computing tools and programs to aid users and to improve data quality.

Data analysis is central to CDIAC’s mission and future. CDIAC analyzes data to address research questions, evaluate national and international policy, test models, and to assess data quality. Examples of recent analyses by CDIAC staff using CDIAC data holdings and compilations include developing finer spatial and temporal anthropogenic carbon emission estimates for the U.S. (Blasing et al. 2004), evaluating forest responses to volcanic eruptions (Gu et al. 2003), summarizing emission inventories for international discussions ( and characterizingthe current state of the ocean carbonate system (Sabine et al. 2004).

The breadth of CDIAC’s technical expertise, coupled with the ability to readily draw on additional relevant expertise at ORNL, has enabled CDIAC to handle and assemble data from many areas of climate change research and will enable the data center to assistmany of the planned multidisciplinary activities of future and evolving climate change programs. This strategic plan outlines our present data activities, lists anticipated data products, and identifies areas where data support is needed and how CDIAC can contribute.
Strategic Goals

The major strategic goals (●) and anticipated products (-) for CDIAC in support of DOE CCRD and the CCSPare to:

● Quantify sources and sinks of energy-related gases, especially carbon dioxide (CO2) and anthropogenic sources of CO2, on spatial and temporal scales necessary to satisfy CCSP goals.

- Monthly fossil-fuel CO2 emission time series for the U.S., Canada, and Mexico

- U.S. state-level fossil-fuel CO2 emission time series

- National, historical land-use CO2 emission time series

- Atmospheric isotopic (13C/C12, 18O/O16, O2/N2) measurements

● Deliver improved climate data for modeling purposes and for policy makers attempting to determine safe levels of greenhouse gases for the Earth system.

- NetCDF and gridded versions of large CDIAC climate databases (e.g., GHCN)

- Web interfaces to facilitate climate data “querying”

- Regional trends analyses of sunshine duration, cloudiness, and snowfall

● Develop information on the North American carbon budget, global carbon cycle, land cover and use, and biological/ecological processes by helping to quantify net emissions of CO2, thereby improving the evaluation of carbon sequestration strategies and alternative response options.

- Monthly fossil-fuel CO2 emission time series for North America

- State and provincial-level NA fossil-fuel CO2 emission time series

- North American historical land-use CO2 emission time series

- NA flux site characterizations (carbon stocks, land use histories)

- Network-wide AmeriFlux and FACE databases for North America

- Terrestrial carbon sequestration data repository

● Contribute towards an integrative and diagnostic modeling effort incorporating in-situ terrestrial, oceanic, and atmospheric data into a synthesis of carbon fluxes.

- Gap-filled and adjusted, continuous AmeriFlux time series

- Network-wide AmeriFlux and FACE databases

- Ocean sulfate aerosol database

- Global Ocean Data Project (GLODAP) database

- Central, relational CDIAC “ocean carbonate database”

● Support short-term (i.e., atmospheric transport) and long-term (i.e., interannual variability) data assimilation modeling efforts.

- Assemble data streams for data assimilation models (e.g., atmospheric isotopic CO2

measurements, VOS underway pCO2 measurements, monthly fossil-fuel CO2

emission time series)

- North American Carbon Program (NACP) Data Management Plan

● Increase knowledge of the interactions among emissions, long-range atmospheric transport, and transformations of atmospheric pollutants, and their response to air quality management strategies.

● Expand data/information capabilities while maintaining and updating existing databases and data products.

Immediate Actions

The following identifies immediate actions to be taken by CDIAC aimed at accomplishing the strategic goals stated above.

● Identify new value-added products and data needed by CCSP, including the North American Carbon Program (NACP), through interactions with modelers, policymakers, and stakeholders to better meet the needs of the end-users of climate change data.

● Inventory the aerosol data requirements, including ocean sulfate aerosols, of the major climate, atmospheric inversion, and carbon cycle models to evaluate whether CDIAC can aid these modeling efforts and their treatment of aerosols by processing or furnishing specific aerosol data products.

● Develop and employ enhanced automation techniques, including mirroring technologies, to improve CDIAC’s ability to rapidly and efficiently maintain and update the current CDIAC data collection.

● Identify data needs of new or evolving DOE CCRD research programs (e.g., Atmospheric Sciences Program) anddevelop data management options and strategies for theseprograms in order to better serve DOE and the larger climate change research community.

● Makepreviously unavailable “classic” data sets, such as Dave Keeling’s long-term atmospheric carbon isotope measurements, available from CDIAC. These classic data sets will improve understanding of the global carbon cycle budget, provide needed constraints for modeling exercises, and preserve data treasures soon to be lost or lessened due to an inability to capture companion metadata.

● Identify the core data sets, presently unavailable, vital to a national terrestrial carbon sequestration data repository to aid carbon sequestration and mitigation strategy efforts in terrestrial systems.

● Incorporate carbon flux measurements from the ARM CART site facility in Oklahoma into the larger AmeriFlux data collection to blend measurements from one of the most intensively monitored sites in the U.S. into a comparable, multi-site network.

●Assist the ARM archive with meteorological definitions and priorities in the context of climate change research in order to make the ARM data collection easier to navigate and more useful to the scientific community and general public.

● Develop a relational database to house CDIAC’s entire data collection, beginning with CDIAC’s underway ocean holdings, to facilitate the development of integration products needed for synthesis activities.

● Enhance CDIAC’s computing and analytical capabilities by taking advantage of ORNL’s GIS and data visualization capabilities to better serve CDIAC’s many users.

● Convert large climate databases into NetCDF format and gridded formats to support “power users” including climate modelers.

These first steps represent examples of CDIAC’s potential contributions to the climate change research programs. We believe CDIAC will not only provide a tremendous service to users of climate change data but also make significant contributions to climate change research including quantifying and evaluating the spatial and temporal variability of anthropogenic CO2 releases, improving model cloud and aerosol parameterization, and developing rich carbon stock and flux information essential to data assimilation modeling and remote-sensing validation efforts.

Present and Future Data Activities

The following sections describe CDIAC’s present efforts and planned activities aimed at satisfying the strategic goals mentioned above.

Present CDIAC Data Emphasis and Activities

CDIAC maintains approximately 300 data sets covering a broad spectrum of topics related to the greenhouse effect and climate change. The breadth of CDIAC’s data holdings makes it unique among national and international data centers whose holdings are traditionally discipline specific (e.g., oceanography) rather than environmental issue-oriented. These data have been submitted by scientists, programs, and data centers around the world or compiled directly by CDIAC. CDIAC does not simply accept every available data set into the CDIAC archive. Efforts are made to evaluate the data set to determine its importance to climate change research and to the mission of DOE. This screening process affords users ready access to high-quality data sets fundamental to climate change research and understanding.

Historically the focus of CDIAC’s data efforts have been the assembly of documentation to enhance the utility of data sets for decades, careful quality evaluation, assembly of important data sets, and data analysis in response to fundamental questions. Data and documentation have been made available without charge through CDIAC’s Web site ( anonymous FTP server, and on other media including floppy diskettes and compact diskettes. CDIAC has also expended resources on outreach and networking products including a newsletter(CDIAC Communications), brochures, glossaries, research summaries, DOE technical reports, and annual reports.

Data residing at CDIAC may be categorized into three primary groups based on source. These sources include 1) core data sets critical to climate change research handled with base CDIAC funding, 2) project data, and 3) orphaned data sets which would be lost if not documented and archived.

The following sections describe CDIAC’s efforts in each of the three data areas and planned activities for the coming years. In addition, other CDIAC focus areas (e.g., networking) are discussed along with future plans, and these plans also address our major strategic goals.

CDIAC Core Data Projects

There are fundamental data sets (e.g., Mauna Loa atmospheric CO2 record, global CO2 emission estimates from fossil-fuel consumption) vital to global changeresearchthat must be preserved, updated, and available always. CDIAC offers many of these “core” data setsto ensure their long-term availability. These “core” data sets span the major climate change research areas including climate observations, atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases, andanthropogenic CO2 emissions.

Long-term Climate Observations

Over the years CDIAC has emphasized analyzing, documenting, compiling, and presenting long-termclimate records suitable for the detection of possible greenhouse gas-induced climate change (i.e., with bias adjustments). These climate records have included cloud observations, temperature and precipitation measurements, snow data, sunshine determinations, and atmospheric pressure records. The CDIAC climate data collection represents some of the largest data sets presently archived at CDIAC. The spatial scale of these records ranges from individual stations to global extent. The temporal resolution of CDIAC’s climate holdings is diverse as well, ranging from hourly records to annual records. Many of the databases presently offered by CDIAC are long-term national data sets for the countries of the world with large land areas. Numerous data sets result from two U.S. DOE bilateral agreements, signed in 1987and 1995, with the People’s Republic of China Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and Chinese Meteorological Administration (CMA) and from interactions with NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) through their participation in the bilaterals.

In the near future, CDIAC will focus on improving delivery of our larger, climate holdings by first building a Web interface to access, visualize, and download data from the U.S. Historical Climatology Network (HCN) and Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN). We will also develop codes to translate our large climate databases into NetCDF format and to generate gridded climate databases in order to accommodate “power users” including climate modelers. Regional trends analyses of sunshine duration, cloudiness, and snowfall will continue in the future. CDIAC will interactimmediately with climate modelers trying to reduce differences between observed temperatures and model simulations in order to better understand the cloud, radiation, and meteorological data requirements of their models. Based on these interactions with modelers, wewill determine whether our climate databases could be modified to better satisfy modeling requirements or if climate and aerosol databases could be assembled to better meet modeling needs. Looking forward CDIAC will continue to maintain and present long-term, global instrumental and ice-core temperature records but will develop scripts to do so in a more automated fashion.

Atmospheric Levels of Greenhouse Gases

Quantifying present and historical abundances of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is fundamental to climate change research. CDIAC has amassed a wealth of high-quality atmospheric measurements of greenhouse gases and reconstructions from ice cores suitable for the evaluating and predicting past, present, and future levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The focus at CDIACin this area has always been to archive records indicative of background tropospheric levels or records of sufficient length to identify long-term trends in atmospheric levels, with records traceable to calibration standards accepted internationally. CDIAC has not pursued short-term measurements from field campaigns aimed at determining present ambient greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere. Several of the data sets available from CDIAC are truly landmark biogeochemical databases not available anywhere else. Among these landmark databases are the ongoing Mauna Loa atmospheric CO2 record dating back to the late 1950s and the multi-species ALE/GAGE/AGAGE records dating back to the 1970s.

To preserve the world’s largest collection of atmospheric CO2 records CDIAC will continue to maintain, update, and present CO2 records from approximately 100 sites worldwide from major national (e.g., Scripps Institution of Oceanography [SIO], NOAA/CMDL) and international (e.g., CSIRO, CNR) measurement groups and will further develop mirroring and processing scripts to automate the effort. During FY 2004 and FY 2005 CDIAC will process, document, and disseminate four additional “classics” important to further understanding the global carbon cycle budget and constraining carbon cycle models and atmospheric inversion models. These four data sets are 1) Dave Keeling’s long-termmeasurements of the 13C/C12 and 18O/O16 ratios in atmospheric CO2 from the SIO network, 2)Nobel prize laureate Sherry Rowland and Don Blake’s long-term, multi-species atmospheric database from their latitudinal, intensive field campaigns of the past twenty years, 3) Ralph Keeling’s long-term O2/N2 ratios from the SIO flask sampling network, and 4) Michael Bender’s long-term 18O/O16 ratios from select NOAA/CMDL flask sampling locations. CDIAC will also continue to obtain, maintain, and present atmospheric records of other important species including methane, carbon monoxide, nitrous oxide, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), halons, and key tracer species (e.g., sulfur hexafluoride).