Meteorological Data from BGS Virkisjökull-Falljökull Glacier Observatory, 2009-2020

This dataset presents meteorological records from 3 weather stations around a glacier in southeast Iceland from 2009-2020. The weather stations were installed as part of British Geological Survey’s Glacier Observatory project, and were positioned at different altitudes close to the ice to record glacier weather. The data is in text format, and records key meteorological parameters including temperature, relative humidity, atmospheric pressure, precipitation, wind speed and direction, and solar irradiance. The weather stations were placed around Virkisjökull-Falljökull, an outlet glacier of the Öraefajökull ice cap in south east Iceland (AWS1 at 16°48'19"W, 63°57'53"N; AWS3 at 16°47'5"W, 63°58'13"N, and AWS4 at 16°48'7"W , 63°59'52"N). AWS1 was installed in September 2009, with AWS3 installed in September 2010, and AWS4 in September 2011. AWS3 and AWS4 were decommissioned in August 2018, and AWS1 in May 2020. AWS1 was located 100m from the current glacier margin at 156m a.s.l.; AWS3 sat 50m from the icefall at 444m a.s.l.; and AWS4 was situated on a clifftop overlooking the glacier at 858m a.s.l., close to the Equilibrium Line Altitude of the glacier. These were positioned at different altitudes to determine changes in weather parameters with height, thus producing for example, temperature or humidity gradients. The three stations were wirelessly linked, allowing data from the upper stations to be offloaded to the datalogger on the lower station. On-site downloads were completed using Campbell Scientific LoggerNet 4.x series software. AWS1 maintained mobile phone telemetry enabling automatic remote downloads of data from all stations on a daily basis, and remote access for software updates and health checks. Each AWS supported a slightly different sensor array, depending on the requirements of the site, and were mounted on 1.5m Campbell Scientific tripods. All of the stations were designed around a Campbell Scientific CR800 datalogger, and were solar powered, using combinations of PV panels up to 100W, supplying a Campbell Scientific 25Ah battery mounted on the tripod, plus a 110Ah gel cell battery back up in a separate housing. The data will be of use to researchers and students interested in the weather of southeast Iceland, glacier climate, local influence of glaciers on more regional synoptic weather systems, glacier climate modellers, glacier hydrologists and hydrogeologists. The BGS project was led and coordinated by Dr Jez Everest, technical support and implementation by Heiko Buxel and data Quality Assurance and checking by Dr Jon Mackay. Any periods where equipment malfunction, testing or replacement meant that no or unreliable data were collected are indicated by a ‘NAN’ value in the datasets.
 
Citation proposal
. Meteorological Data from BGS Virkisjökull-Falljökull Glacier Observatory, 2009-2020. https://metadata.bgs.ac.uk/geonetwork/srv/api/records/adb1eb5c-94b1-14a4-e054-002128a47908

Simple

Date ( Creation )
2020-08-24
Identifier
http://data.bgs.ac.uk/id/dataHolding/13607659

  Originator

  Distributor

  0115 936 3276 

  Originator

  0115 936 3276 

  Point of contact

  0115 936 3276 

  Distributor

  0115 936 3276 

  Originator

  0115 936 3276 
Maintenance and update frequency
notPlanned Not planned
GEMET - INSPIRE themes
  • Geology
BGS Thesaurus of Geosciences
  • Weather , Observatories , Meteorological stations , Meteorology
Keywords
  • NERC_DDC
Access constraints
otherRestrictions Other restrictions
Use constraints
otherRestrictions Other restrictions
Other constraints
The copyright of materials derived from the British Geological Survey's work is vested in the Natural Environment Research Council [NERC]. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a retrieval system of any nature, without the prior permission of the copyright holder, via the BGS Intellectual Property Rights Manager. Use by customers of information provided by the BGS, is at the customer's own risk. In view of the disparate sources of information at BGS's disposal, including such material donated to BGS, that BGS accepts in good faith as being accurate, the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) gives no warranty, expressed or implied, as to the quality or accuracy of the information supplied, or to the information's suitability for any use. NERC/BGS accepts no liability whatever in respect of loss, damage, injury or other occurence however caused.
Other constraints
Available under the Open Government Licence subject to the following acknowledgement accompanying the reproduced NERC materials "Contains NERC materials ©NERC [year]"
Metadata language
English English
Topic category
  • Geoscientific information
Geographic identifier
ICELAND [id=903000]

 

Date ( Creation )
1979

Geographic identifier
IS

 

Date ( Revision )
2009

Geographic identifier
ISL

 

Date ( Revision )
2009

N
S
E
W


Reference System Information

No information provided.
Distribution format
  • TXT files ()

  Distributor

  0115 936 3276 

  Distributor

  0115 936 3276 
OnLine resource
https://www.bgs.ac.uk/services/ngdc/accessions/index.html#item137325  
Hierarchy level
dataset Dataset
Other
dataset

Conformance result

Date ( Publication )
2011
Explanation
See the referenced specification
Pass
false

Conformance result

Date ( Publication )
2010-12-08
Explanation
See http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2010:323:0011:0102:EN:PDF
Pass
false
Statement
The study operated three automated weather stations: AWS1 located 100m from the current glacier margin at 156m a.s.l. AWS3 50m from the icefall at 444m a.s.l. AWS4 situated on a clifftop overlooking the glacier at 858m a.s.l., close to the Equilibrium Line Altitude of the glacier.These were positioned at different altitudes to determine changes in weather parameters with height, thus producing eg, temperature or humidity gradients. All stations were wirelessly linked. On-site downloads were completed using Campbell Scientific LoggerNet 4.x series software. AWS1 maintained mobile phone telemetry enabling automatic remote downloads of data from all stations on a regular basis, and remote access for software updates and health checks. The stations were mounted on 1.5m Campbell Scientific tripods and used a Campbell Scientific CR800 datalogger. All AWS were solar powered.

gmd:MD_Metadata

File identifier
adb1eb5c-94b1-14a4-e054-002128a47908   XML
Metadata language
English English
Hierarchy level
dataset Dataset
Date stamp
2021-02-25
Metadata standard version
2.3

  Point of contact

Dataset URI
http://data.bgs.ac.uk/id/dataHolding/13607659
 
 

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