NOAA Weather Analysis

High Temperature Record Frequency

Goal

Given historical data for a weather station in the US, what is the frequency for new high temperature records?

If there is scientific evidence of extreme fluctuations in our weather patterns due to human impact to the environment, then we should be able to identify factual examples of increases in the frequency in extreme temperature changes within the weather station data.

There has been a great deal of discussion around climate change and global warming. Since NOAA has made their data public, let us explore the data ourselves and see what insights we can discover.

General Analytical Questions

For each of the possible 365 days of the year, given a US weather station, can we identify the frequency at which daily High and Low temperature records are broken.
Does the historical frequency of daily temperature records (High or Low) in the US provide statistical evidence of dramatic climate change?
For a given weather stattion, what is the longest duration of daily temperature record (High or Low) in the US?

Approach

This analysis is based on a 15-March-2015 snapshot of the Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) dataset.
This analysis leverages Historical Daily Summary weather station information that was generated using data derived from reproducible research. This summary data captures information about a given day throughout history at a specific weather station in the US. This dataset contains 365 rows where each row depicts the aggregated low and high record temperatures for a specific day throughout the history of the weather station.
Each US weather station is associated with a single CSV file that contains historical daily summary.
All temperatures reported in Fahrenheit.

Analysis

Select a US weather station using a NOAA station ID.
Select the maximum threshold of daily high temperature records.



In [1]:

    
%matplotlib inline



In [2]:

    
# Import special helper functions for the IBM Knowledge Anyhow Workbench.
import kawb



In [5]:

    
# Import processing tools. 
import mywb.noaaquery_tmaxfreq_tools as noaatools



In [4]:

    
noaatools.noaaquery()









    



Historical high temperature record analysis for weather station USC00026250 at PARKER in AZ.






    






  
    
      
      StationID
      State
      Name
      Latitude
      Longitude
      QueryTag
    
  
  
    
      24
       USC00026250
       AZ
       PARKER
       34.1547
       -114.2897
       USC00026250 at PARKER in AZ
    
  








    



Station detail, quick glimpse.






    






  
    
      
      StationID
      Month
      Day
      FirstYearOfRecord
      TMin
      TMinRecordYear
      TMax
      TMaxRecordYear
      CurTMinMaxDelta
      CurTMinRecordDur
      CurTMaxRecordDur
      MaxDurTMinRecord
      MinDurTMinRecord
      MaxDurTMaxRecord
      MinDurTMaxRecord
      TMinRecordCount
      TMaxRecordCount
    
  
  
    
      0
       USC00026250
       1
       1
       1894
       12.2
       1912
       82.4
       1981
       70.2
       103
        34
       11
       7
        63
       3
       3
       5
    
    
      1
       USC00026250
       1
       2
       1894
       15.8
       1901
       80.6
       1981
       64.8
       114
        34
        7
       7
        83
       4
       2
       3
    
    
      2
       USC00026250
       1
       3
       1894
       12.2
       1912
       82.4
       1902
       70.2
       103
       113
       10
       1
         4
       1
       5
       4
    
    
      3
       USC00026250
       1
       4
       1894
       17.6
       1950
       80.6
       1902
       63.0
        65
       113
       45
       5
         4
       1
       4
       4
    
    
      4
       USC00026250
       1
       5
       1894
       15.8
       1894
       78.8
       2006
       63.0
       121
         9
        0
       0
       104
       1
       1
       5
    
  








    



This weather station has been in service and collecting data for 122 years.
This station has experienced 9 days of new record highs where a new record has been set more than 6 times throughout the operation of the station.






    






  
    
      
      StationID
      Month
      Day
      FirstYearOfRecord
      TMin
      TMinRecordYear
      TMax
      TMaxRecordYear
      CurTMinMaxDelta
      CurTMinRecordDur
      CurTMaxRecordDur
      MaxDurTMinRecord
      MinDurTMinRecord
      MaxDurTMaxRecord
      MinDurTMaxRecord
      TMinRecordCount
      TMaxRecordCount
    
  
  
    
      6  
       USC00026250
        1
        7
       1894
        8.6
       1894
        82.4
       1962
       73.8
       121
       53
        0
       0
       34
       1
       1
       8
    
    
      16 
       USC00026250
        1
       17
       1895
       19.4
       1925
        82.4
       1976
       63.0
        90
       39
       14
       1
       47
       1
       6
       7
    
    
      201
       USC00026250
        7
       16
       1894
       60.8
       1905
       118.4
       1925
       57.6
       110
       90
        6
       5
       12
       2
       3
       7
    
    
      298
       USC00026250
       10
       20
       1893
       35.6
       1949
       105.8
       2003
       70.2
        66
       12
       51
       1
       74
       2
       5
       7
    
    
      299
       USC00026250
       10
       21
       1893
       35.6
       1919
       105.8
       2003
       70.2
        96
       12
       25
       1
       82
       1
       3
       7
    
    
      305
       USC00026250
       10
       27
       1893
       28.4
       1912
        98.6
       2008
       70.2
       103
        7
        3
       2
       98
       1
       4
       7
    
    
      364
       USC00026250
       12
       24
       1893
       17.6
       1911
        80.6
       1950
       63.0
       104
       65
       16
       1
       44
       1
       4
       7
    
    
      365
       USC00026250
       12
       25
       1893
       10.4
       1911
        78.8
       1942
       68.4
       104
       73
       16
       2
       23
       1
       3
       7
    
    
      366
       USC00026250
       12
       26
       1893
       10.4
       1911
        80.6
       1947
       70.2
       104
       68
       16
       2
       32
       1
       3
       7
    
  








    



Displayed above are the details for up to the first 10 new record high events. All records are ploted below.

This notebook was created using IBM Knowledge Anyhow Workbench. To learn more, visit us at https://knowledgeanyhow.org.

Resources

This analytical notebook is a component of a package of notebooks. The package is intended to serve as an exercise in the applicability of IPython/Juypter Notebooks to public weather data for DIY Analytics.
The Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) - Daily dataset integrates daily climate observations from approximately 30 different data sources. Over 25,000 worldwide weather stations are regularly updated with observations from within roughly the last month.

Citation Information

GHCN-Daily journal article: Menne, M.J., I. Durre, R.S. Vose, B.E. Gleason, and T.G. Houston, 2012: An overview of the Global Historical Climatology Network-Daily Database. Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology, 29, 897-910.
Menne, M.J., I. Durre, B. Korzeniewski, S. McNeal, K. Thomas, X. Yin, S. Anthony, R. Ray, R.S. Vose, B.E.Gleason, and T.G. Houston, 2012: Global Historical Climatology Network - Daily (GHCN-Daily), [Version 3.20-upd-2015031605], NOAA National Climatic Data Center [March 16, 2015].

	StationID	Month	Day	FirstYearOfRecord	TMin	TMinRecordYear	TMax	TMaxRecordYear	CurTMinMaxDelta	CurTMinRecordDur	CurTMaxRecordDur	MaxDurTMinRecord	MinDurTMinRecord	MaxDurTMaxRecord	MinDurTMaxRecord	TMinRecordCount	TMaxRecordCount
0	USC00026250	1	1	1894	12.2	1912	82.4	1981	70.2	103	34	11	7	63	3	3	5
1	USC00026250	1	2	1894	15.8	1901	80.6	1981	64.8	114	34	7	7	83	4	2	3
2	USC00026250	1	3	1894	12.2	1912	82.4	1902	70.2	103	113	10	1	4	1	5	4
3	USC00026250	1	4	1894	17.6	1950	80.6	1902	63.0	65	113	45	5	4	1	4	4
4	USC00026250	1	5	1894	15.8	1894	78.8	2006	63.0	121	9	0	0	104	1	1	5