Weather and Climate Inventory, Klamath Network, National Park Service, 2007

Appendix C. Factors in operating a weather/climate network

 C.1. Climate versus Weather

• Climate measurements require consistency through time.

C.2. Network Purpose

• Anticipated or desired lifetime.
• Breadth of network mission (commitment by needed constituency).
• Dedicated constituency—no network survives without a dedicated constituency.

C.3. Site Identification and Selection

• Spanning gradients in climate or biomes with transects.
• Issues regarding representative spatial scale—site uniformity versus site clustering.
• Alignment with and contribution to network mission.
• Exposure—ability to measure representative quantities.
• Logistics—ability to service station (Always or only in favorable weather?).
• Site redundancy (positive for quality control, negative for extra resources).
• Power—is AC needed?
• Site security—is protection from vandalism needed?
• Permitting often a major impediment and usually underestimated.

C.4. Station Hardware

• Survival—weather is the main cause of lost weather/climate data.
• Robustness of sensors—ability to measure and record in any condition.
• Quality—distrusted records are worthless and a waste of time and money.
• High quality—will cost up front but pays off later.
• Low quality—may provide a lower start-up cost but will cost more later (low cost can be expensive).
• Redundancy—backup if sensors malfunction.
• Ice and snow—measurements are much more difficult than rain measurements.
• Severe environments (expense is about two–three times greater than for stations in more benign settings).

C.5. Communications

• Reliability—live data have a much larger constituency.
• One-way or two-way.
• Retrieval of missed transmissions.
• Ability to reprogram data logger remotely.
• Remote troubleshooting abilities.
• Continuing versus one-time costs.
• Back-up procedures to prevent data loss during communication outages.
• Live communications increase problems but also increase value.