Dataset: NOWESP

Summary

Within the MAST project NOWESP (Laane et al., 1996) all available observations of the parameters temperature, salinity, phosphate, nitrate, nitrite, ammonium, silicate, suspended particulate matter and chlorophyll from the north-west European shelf region were compiled in a data base (Radach et al., 1996). This was a follow up of ECOMOD, and various products were derived from the original data: Annual cycles of climatological data interpolated on a 20 x 20 km grid for the shelf (Radach and Gekeler, 1996; Radach and Gekeler, 1997) and time series of climatological monthly means (Sündermann et al., 1996; Visser et al., 1996).

In the NOWESP dataset many important survey and monitoring datasets from European institutions were included: datasets from the Biologische Anstalt Helgoland (including the Helgoland Reede time series from 1962 to 1995), the British NERC NSP (BODC, Bidston), the Bundesamt für Seeschifffahrt und Hydrographie in Hamburg (BSH), HELCOM, ICES in Copenhagen, the Institut für Ostseeforschung in Warnemünde (IOW), the Institute for Marine Research in Bergen (IMR), the Institut für Meereskunde at University of Hamburg (IfM), the Rijkswaterstaat (RIKZ) in Den Haag (including the Dutch monitoring data), and many others. Details of compiled data were given by Radach and Gekeler (1997).

The most important time series created for validation purposes of North Sea models were the following time series of monthly means Initiates file download(see Figure for area):

NOWESP site 2 based on the long time series at station E1 in the Channel off Plymouth

NOWESP sites 4-1, 4-2, 4-3 based on Belgian monitoring data during 1975-1993

NOWESP sites 5-1, 5-2, 5-3 based on Dutch monitoring data during 1975-1993, including the stations on the sections Noordwijk and Terschelling

NOWESP site 6 based on German monitoring data from 1962-1995 which consist mainly of the time series at Helgoland Reede during the time range 1962-1993

NOWESP sites 7-1 and 7-2 in the Skagerrak based on the long-term data from the sections Hirtshals - Torungen (1980-1992) and the experiment SCAGEX

The NOWESP data products are available as separate ASCII files ->Nowesp.zip in the NOWESP format, and as one ASCII file ->NOWESP_BIOGEO.ZIP in the Ocean Data View format. The ODV-download also includes a "read.me"-file describing the corresponding .o4x file. The file NOWESP_biogeo.o4x contains all biogeochemical data of the NOWESP data set and the corresponding T and S data. It does not include the total NOWESP data set of T and S.

The NOWESP_biogeo.o4x includes:

240.335 phosphate entries

178.264 chlorophyll entries

162.092 nitrate entries

151.084 SPM entries

140.244 silicate entries

131.457 nitrite entries

96.198 ammonium entries

In ODV these data are gathered by 125.107 stations with a maximum vertical resolution of 100 levels. The the original NOWESP-data of Salinity (473.825) and Temperature (524.692) were reduced to 284733 Salinity entries and 296129 Temperature entries in NOWESP_biogeo.o4x.

For questions please contact ->Andreas Moll, or ->Johannes Pätsch, Institut für Meereskunde, Hamburg, Germany.

References

Laane, R.W.P.M., van Leussen, W., Radach, G., Berlamont, J., Sündermann, J., van Raaphorst, W. and Colijn, F., 1996. North-West European shelf programme (NOWESP): An Overview. Deutsche hydrographische Zeitschrift, 48(3/4): 217-229.

Radach, G., Gekeler, J., Becker, G., Bot, P., Castaing, P., Colijn, F., Damm, P., Danielssen, D., Foyn, L., Gamble, J.C., Laane, R., Mommaerts, J.P., Nehring, D., Pegler, K., van Raaphorst, W. and Wilson, J., 1996.

The NOWESP Research Data Base. Deutsche hydrographische Zeitschrift, 48(3/4): 241-259.

Radach, G. and Gekeler, J., 1996. Annual cycles of horizontal distributions of temperature and salinity, and of concentrations of nutrients, suspended particulate matter and chlorophyll on the northwest European shelf. Deutsche Hydrographische Zeitschrift, 48(3/4): 261-297.Annual cycles of horizontal distributions of temperature and salinity, and of concentrations of nutrients, suspended particulate matter and chlorophyll on the northwest European shelf. Deutsche Hydrographische Zeitschrift, 48(3/4): 261-297.

Visser, M., Batten, S., Becker, G., Bot, P., Colijn, F., Damm, P., Danielssen, D., van den Eynde, D., Foyn, L., Frohse, A., Groeneveld, G., Laane, R., van Raaphorst, W., Radach, G., Schultz, H. and Sündermann, J., 1996. Time series analysis of monthly mean data of temperature, salinity, nutrients, suspended matter, phyto- and zooplankton at eight locations on the Northwest European shelf. Deutsche hydrographische Zeitschrift, 48(3/4): 299-323.

Sündermann, J., Becker, G., Damm, P., van den Eynde, D., Frohse, A., Laane, R., van Leussen, W., Pohlmann, T., van Raaphorst, W., Radach, G., Schultz, H. and Visser, M., 1996. Decadal Variability on the Northwest European Shelf. Deutsche hydrographische Zeitschrift, 48(3/4): 365-400.