U.S. Historical Snow Data Base

该项目的目标是利用美国国家气候数据中心（NCDC）的档案，建立一个经过严格验证的美国过去100年的降雪、积雪和雪水当量的历史数据库。该数据库将用于评估一般环流模式在模拟积雪和雪-气候相互作用方面的能力，并评估使用积雪记录作为气候变化指标的效用。该数据库将在项目的第一年由首席研究员在国家数据中心组装，并在第二年与建模人员合作进行分析。雪是气候系统的重要组成部分。气候模式和实证研究表明，降雪异常与天气和长期天气事件有关，可能在气候变化中发挥重要作用。然而，关于雪的变率、短期经验研究的代表性以及雪-气候相互作用模型的准确性等问题仍有许多悬而未决的问题，需要用长期数据库来解决。

The objective of this project is to construct a critically- verified historical data base of snowfall, snow cover and snow water equivalent in the United States for the last 100 years using the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) archives. The data base will be used to assess the capabilities of general circulation models in the simulation of snow cover and snow- climate interactions and assess the utility of using snow records as indicators of climatic change. The data base will be assembled at NCDC by the principal investigator during the first year of the project, and analysed in cooperation with modelers during the second year. Snow is a critical element of the climate system. Climate models and empirical studies suggest that snow anomalies are associated with synoptic and long-term weather events and may play an important role in climate change. However, there remain many unanswered questions regarding the variability of snow, the representativeness of short-term empirical studies and the accuracy of the modeling of snow-climate interactions which need to be addressed with a long-term data base.