May 15, 2014

POINT OF CONTACT

Principle investigator:
     Kirk L. Clawson
     NOAA Air Resources Laboratory Field Research Division
     1750 Foote Dr.
     Idaho Falls, ID 83402
     Kirk.Clawson@noaa.gov
     (208) 526-2742

README.TXT - Description of Mesonet Data Files

ARLFRD has maintained a large network of (presently) 34 meteorological stations or 
towers across the Eastern Snake River Plain that includes the INL and the local 
test area at Grid 3.  The Mesonet recorded data as averages, totals, or extremes 
over a 5-minute period.  Wind speed, wind direction, air temperature, relative 
humidity, and solar radiation were measured every 1-second and averaged over the 
5-minute period.  Precipitation was totaled for the same 5-minute interval.  
Maximum and minimum air temperatures for the same 5-minute period are each selected 
from one of the 300 one-second scans used to assemble the 5-minute average.   A 
3-second average wind gust is selected as the maximum of a 3-second running average 
of wind speed.  Data was collected by a datalogger and transmitted every 5-minutes 
by a radio link back to the FRD office and eventually onto the Internet.  

Mesonet instrumentation, was carefully selected to meet required and generally 
accepted guidelines, including DOE/EH-0173T (1991), Environmental Regulatory Guide 
for Radiological Effluent Monitoring and Environmental Surveillance,  DOE Order 
151.1c, Comprehensive Emergency Management System, 2005; and ANSI/ANS 3.11, 
Determining Meteorological Information at Nuclear Facilities, 2005. 

Files in this section contain subsets of data from the NOAA/INL Mesonet towers near 
the location of PSB1. The Mesonet data files are broken up into two rings based 
on the distance to the Grid 3 area. The inner ring consists of Mesonet stations that 
are within 10 miles of the Grid 3 study area. The outer ring consists of Mesonet 
stations that are between 10-20 miles of the Grid 3 study area. All files are archived 
in csv format. The first of these records in each file is a header record. The first 
four columns in each header record are the year, month, day of month, and time in hhmm 
format for the end of the five minute period for the data record. Times are Mountain 
Standard Time (MST). 

The following columns in the header record describe the location, height, description
of the measurement, and the units of the measurement. The general format of these column 
headers is 'NNN ##M MMMM Units' or 'NNN ##M FFFF' where 'NNN' is a 3-character site 
identifier (tower code), '##' is the height of the measurement (AGL, m), 'MMMM' is a 
description of the measurement, 'FFFF' is a quality flag code, and 'Units' specifies 
the units of the measurement. The measurement and flag fields are always paired in 
successive columns.

The remaining records in each data file contain 5-minute average data values for each 
measurement or its paired quality flag value. The flags are assigned during quality 
assurance procedures which are executed after the data have been collected. The flag 
values which appear in these files consist of the following:

Flag
Value    Interpretation

   0     Data OK
   5     Data affected by maintenance
  10     Data values too small
  30     Data value constant or changes too slowly
  72     Instrument (including rain gage) affected by ice/snow
  73     Very low wind speed - excessively high threshold value
  75     Temperature or relative humidity values inaccurate due to
         inoperative aspirator
  78     Values too high
  79     Bad data due to unknown cause
  80     Orientation error in wind direction
 121     Suspect data

The file names are given in the format 'MESORING#SAGEBRUSH_OctDD' where '#' specifies
the ring ('1' within 10 miles, '2' for 10-20 miles) and 'DD' specifies the day in
October during which the IOP was conducted. 

Mesonet data files with RING1 in their names contain data from nine
towers located closest to the experiment location.

These towers are:

Tower   Latitude    Longitude   Elevation   Facility or
Code    (deg N)      (deg W)    (ft MSL)    Location Name

 690   43.532598   112.947757     4950      Central Facilities (building 690)
 BAS   43.677557   113.006053     4900      Base of Howe Peak
 DEA   43.624868   113.059840     5108      Dead Man Canyon
 GRI   43.589718   112.939855     4897      INTEC/Grid 3
 LOS   43.548538   113.008460     4983      Lost River Rest Area
 NRF   43.647887   112.911193     4847      Naval Reactors Facility
 PBF   43.547477   112.869697     4910      Critical Infrastructure Complex (formerly PBF)
 RWM   43.503362   113.046030     5025      Radioactive Waste Management Complex
 TRA   43.584612   112.968653     4937      Reactor Technologies Complex (formerly TRA)

Mesonet data files with RING2 in their names contain data from ten
other towers.

These towers are:

Tower   Latitude    Longitude   Elevation   Facility or
Code    (deg N)      (deg W)    (ft MSL)    Location Name

 ARC   43.624522   113.297087     5290      Arco
 ATO   43.443700   112.812400     5058      Atomic City
 BIG   43.294095   113.181607     5200      Cox's Well (formerly Big Southern)
 EBR   43.594138   112.651713     5143      Materials Fuels Complex (formerly EBR II)
 HOW   43.784113   112.977358     4815      Howe
 LOF   43.859793   112.730253     4790      Specific Manufacturing Capability (formerly LOFT)
 ROV   43.720590   112.529560     5008      Rover
 SAN   43.779632   112.758165     4820      Sand Dunes
 SUM   43.396300   113.021800     7576      Big Southern Summit
 TAB   43.318700   112.691875     4730      Taber
