UV index & UV dose based on GOME	UV radiation monitoring
Overview of the data product archive

Time series of the erythemal UV index & UV dose

The time evolution of the erythemal UV index at local solar noon and the daily erythemal UV dose (which is based on Meteosat cloud cover information) has been gathered together in a single (zip-ed) data file for a number of ground stations and places in Europe and Surinam. The following table lists the places in alphabetic order.

The place name in the left column itself is a link to a page showing a summary of monthly averages, yearly averages and climatologies of the erythemal UV index and UV dose.

Some further notes regarding the data file are given below the table.
An example of a time series is given on a separate page.
If you would like a certain station or place to be added to this list, please let us know.

Notes

The list in the table above gives for each ground station the geographical coordinates (in degrees) and the altitude (in metres) of that station. If there is no ground station known in a place listed above, the coordinates are those of the inhabited place, and no elevation is given.

The UV index and UV dose are computed at a grid of 0.5 by 0.5 degrees and the values listed in the data files are values for the whole grid cell. The header of the data file specifies the centre coordinates of this grid cell, and the average grid cell elevation (which is, of course, in general not the same as the altitude of the station listed above!).

The time series data files give for each day between 1 August 1995 and 31 May 2003:

• the date: year, month, day
• albedo from the TOMS/GOME based LER
• solar zenith angle at local solar noon [degrees]
• Earth-Sun distance factor [-]
• sunrise and sunset [hours]
• ozone column local solar noon [DU]
• clear-sky erythemal UV index at local solar noon [-]
• erythemal UV dose using Meteosat cloud cover [kJ/m2]
  note: Meteosat cloud cover data is available only
    - since 1 August 1998 and is missing on individual days after that
    - for a large part of Europe
• erythemal UV dose assuming the sky is fully clouded [kJ/m2]
• erythemal UV dose assuming the sky is cloud-free [kJ/m2]
• ratio between the clear-sky UV dose and the "real" UV dose [-],
  as a measure for the cloudiness of the day.

The data file reports as error for the ozone column the forecast error of the data assimilation used to find the ozone field. The error reported for the UV index and dose values is the error solely due to the error in the ozone column (errors in other elements of the algorithm which produces the UV index and UV dose are not taken into account).

last modified: April 2008
data product contact: Jos van Geffen & Ronald van der A
Copyright © KNMI / TEMIS