Input Data & Bias Correction

Input data:

The ISIMIP framework includes bias-corrected climate-input data sets on a 0.5°x0.5°C global grid and at daily time steps, as well as socio-economic and human-influence data:

ISIMIP3 data sets are described in the respective protocols.
Detailed information on specific data sets, as well as on data from previous simulation rounds can be found in the table below.
For the ISIMIP3 simulation round, the protocol newly includes a counterfactual “no-climate change baseline” (detrended climate + observed socio-economic forcing) to allow for the detection and attribution of observed impacts according to the WGII-AR5 Chapter 18 definition.
If published input data sets for any reason need to be replaced or updated, you will find details of these changes in the input data change log below.

Please find here information about accessing ISIMIP input data.

Bias correction:

The methods used for bias correction and statistical downscaling of climate model output have been updated and improved in every ISIMIP phase. For information about the methods used in the different ISIMIP phases see:

Availability of ISIMIP2b input data:

Use the table's search box to limit input data sets to a chosen simulation round, data type, or to search for a specific data set.

Data set	Protocol relation	Data type	Simulation round	Description
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CESM1-BEC (ocean)	Protocol	Simulated ocean climate	ISIMIP2b	Ocean data from the GCM CESM1-BEC. Data is available for the following time periods: piControl (1850-2100), historical (1850-2005), rcp85 (2006-2100).
MRI-ESM2-0	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3b	Pre-industrial (1601-1849), historical (1850-2014) and future (2015-2100) conditions provided based on the bias adjustment and statistical downscaling of CMIP6 output from MRI-ESM2-0, using ISIMIP3BASD v2.5.0 and W5E5 v2.0. CMIP6 experiments used in ISIMIP3b are piControl, historical, ssp126 (SSP1-RCP2.6), ssp370 (SSP3-RCP7) and ssp585 (SSP5-RCP8.5).
IPSL-CM6A-LR	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3b	Pre-industrial (1601-1849), historical (1850-2014) and future (2015-2100) conditions provided based on the bias adjustment and statistical downscaling of CMIP6 output from IPSL-CM6A-LR, using ISIMIP3BASD v2.5.0 and W5E5 v2.0. CMIP6 experiments used in ISIMIP3b are piControl, historical, ssp126 (SSP1-RCP2.6), ssp370 (SSP3-RCP7) and ssp585 (SSP5-RCP8.5).
MPI-ESM1-2-HR	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3b	Pre-industrial (1601-1849), historical (1850-2014) and future (2015-2100) conditions provided based on the bias adjustment and statistical downscaling of CMIP6 output from MPI-ESM1-2-HR, using ISIMIP3BASD v2.5.0 and W5E5 v2.0. CMIP6 experiments used in ISIMIP3b are piControl, historical, ssp126 (SSP1-RCP2.6), ssp370 (SSP3-RCP7) and ssp585 (SSP5-RCP8.5).
UKESM1-0-LL	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3b	Pre-industrial (1601-1849), historical (1850-2014) and future (2015-2100) conditions provided based on the bias adjustment and statistical downscaling of CMIP6 output from UKESM1-0-LL, using ISIMIP3BASD v2.5.0 and W5E5 v2.0. CMIP6 experiments used in ISIMIP3b are piControl, historical, ssp126 (SSP1-RCP2.6), ssp370 (SSP3-RCP7) and ssp585 (SSP5-RCP8.5).
GFDL-ESM4	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3b	Pre-industrial (1601-1849), historical (1850-2014) and future (2015-2100) conditions provided based on the bias adjustment and statistical downscaling of CMIP6 output from GFDL-ESM4, using ISIMIP3BASD v2.5.0 and W5E5 v2.0. CMIP6 experiments used in ISIMIP3b are piControl, historical, ssp126 (SSP1-RCP2.6), ssp370 (SSP3-RCP7) and ssp585 (SSP5-RCP8.5).
Wood harvesting	Protocol	Other human influences	ISIMIP3a	Historical annual country-level wood harvesting data, covering the period 1850-2017.
Historical, gridded land use	Protocol	Land use	ISIMIP3a	Historical land-use (LU) changes for the time period 1850-2018.
Historical gridded Gross Domestic Product (GDP)	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a	Annual gridded GDP data for 1861-2016.
GSWP3-W5E5	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3a ISIMIP2a	W5E5 global meteorological forcing data processed for ISIMIP2a/ISIMIP3a.
Historical, gridded and country-level population	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2a	Population (1860 - 2020) at country level, and on 0.5°x0.5° and 5arcmin grid level
W5E5	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3b	The W5E5 dataset was compiled to support the bias correction of climate input data for ISIMIP3b. For a full technical description, see "Data source" below. Data is available for the time period 1979-2016.
GSWP3-EWEMBI	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2a	EWEMBI global meteorological forcing data processed for ISIMIP2a.
Reservoirs and dams	Protocol	Other	ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a ISIMIP Fast Track	Extension of GRanD reservoirs & dams data. For some dams for which no construction/commissioning years were given in GRanDv1.1, they were added by PIK according to various sources (see column “SOURCE”). The dam location data previously to 2010 is based on GRanDv1.1 (Lehner et al., 2011, DOI: 10.1890/100125), but adjusted to match the river-routing network in DDM30. After 2010, the data has been provided by Dr. Jida Wang, from Kansas State University (KSU). Mapping algorithm developed by Andreas Dobler. Manual mapping done by M.Rocío Rivas, PIK.
Human and economic losses from river flooding	Secondary	Other	ISIMIP Fast Track	Increased human and economic losses from river flooding with anthropogenic warming. The data set includes: - Static maps (land use, economic variables, population) used to compute impacts - For each model realization, the merged global maps of economic damage for the historical (hist) and future (rcp8p5) periods, as well as statistic tables of impacts aggregated per continent and per country - For each model realization, the merged global maps of population affected computed with current socioeconomic conditions and with SSP3 and SSP5 population projections, and the statistic tables of impacts aggregated per continent and per country - Tables of variables used as input in the impact assessment procedure - Tables describing aggregated impact results
Future, gridded population (all SSPs)	Secondary	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b	Annual global population data at 0.5° and 2.5' resolutions for the years 2006-2100 based on the population projections described in Jones & O’Neill (2016)
MIROC5 (rcp45)	Secondary	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Future (2006-2099) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from MIROC5. These data are analogous to the data described here: https://www.isimip.org/gettingstarted/details/21/ but for this RCP not included in the ISIMIP2b simulation protocol.
HadGEM2-ES (rcp45)	Secondary	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Future (2006-2099) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from HadGEM2-ES. These data are analogous to the data described here: https://www.isimip.org/gettingstarted/details/52/ but for the this RCP not included in the ISIMIP2b simulation protocol.
IPSL-CM5A-LR (rcp45)	Secondary	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Future (2006-2299) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from IPSL-CM5A-LR. These data are analogous to the data described here: https://www.isimip.org/gettingstarted/details/53/ but for this RCP not included in the ISIMIP2b simulation protocol.
GFDL-ESM2M (rcp45)	Secondary	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Future (2006-2099) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from GFDL-ESM2M. These data are analogous to the data described here: https://www.isimip.org/gettingstarted/details/51/ but for this RCP not included in the ISIMIP2b simulation protocol.
Future land-use patterns	Protocol	Land use	ISIMIP2b	Time-varying historical crop-land areas for 6 land-use types: rain-fed crop land, irrigated crop-land, rain-fed bioenergy, irrigated bio-energy, pastures, natural vegetation and urban areas. For more specific information, thd data are provided in 5 different resolutions of land-use types: landuse-totals: the land surface is broadly categorized into rainfed (cropland_rainfed) and irrigated cropland (cropland_irrigated), and into pastures (pastures) landuse-5crops: the distribution of the five predominant crop types (c3ann, c3per, c4ann, c4per and c3nfx), delineating both occurences of rainfed/irrigated crops and occurences of nutrition/bioenergy crops landuse-15crops: provides areas specific to either important species, e.g. wheat, or species groups, such as pulses landuse-pastures: pastures areas are split into managed pastures (managed_pastures) and rangeland (rangeland) landuse-urbanareas: provides the per-cell coverage of urban areas Data is available for the time period 2006-2099.
Historical, country-level population	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b	Country-level population data for the years 1861-2005.
Future, gridded Gross Domestic Product (GDP)	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b	Annual GDP data on a 0.5°x0.5° grid for 2006-2099.
Future, country-level Gross Domestic Product (GDP)	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b	Annual country-level GDP data for the SSP2 scenario for 2006-2100 based on a linear temporal interpolation of the OECD data.
IPSL-CM5A-LR	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Pre-industrial (1661-1860), historical (1861-2005), future (RCP2.6 (2006-2100), RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 (2006-2099)) and extended-future (RCP2.6 and RCP8.5 (2100-2299)) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from IPSL-CM5A-LR.
HadGEM2-ES	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Pre-industrial (1661-1860), historical (1861-2005), future (RCP2.6 (2006-2100), RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 (2006-2099)) and extended-future (RCP2.6, 2100-2299) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from HadGEM2-ES.
GFDL-ESM2M	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Pre-industrial (1661-1860), historical (1861-2005) and future (RCP2.6 (2006-2099), RCP6.0 (2006-2099) and RCP8.5 (2006-2099)) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from GFDL-ESM2M.
Fishing intensity	Protocol	Other human influences	ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a	Catch data by country or EEZ or LME or globally. Covers 1950-2015.
Historical, gridded land use (HYDE 3.0)	Protocol	Land use	ISIMIP2a	Time-varying historical crop-land areas for 12 crop-functional types and pastures for rainfed and irrigated land use for the years 1700-2012. Based on MIRCA 2000 and historical trends from HYDE 3.0.
Land-sea mask	Protocol	Other	ISIMIP3b ISIMIP3a ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a ISIMIP Fast Track	Land-sea masks, on a global 0.5°x0.5° lat-lon grid, for the different ISIMIP simulation rounds.
Water abstraction for domestic and industrial uses	Protocol	Other human influences	ISIMIP2b	Water abstraction for domestic and industrial uses consistent with SSP2. Histsoc (1901-2005); rcp26soc (2006-2099); rcp60soc (2006-2099); 2100rcp26soc (2100-2299).
3D ocean temperature (monthly)	Protocol	Simulated ocean climate	ISIMIP2b	Non bias-corrected 3D oceanic temperature fields on original GCM grid with monthly resolution from the GCMs: IPSL-CM5A-LR, GFDL-ESM2M, MIROC5, HadGEM2-ES.
3D temperature & humidity (monthly)	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Non bias-corrected 3D humidity and temperature fields on original GCM grid with monthly resolution from the GCMs: IPSL-CM5A-LR, GFDL-ESM2M, MIROC5, HadGEM2-ES.
CO2 concentration	Protocol	Emissions	ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a ISIMIP Fast Track	Atmospheric CO2 concentration for 1661-2299. Values are constant for 1661-1860, following observations from 1861-2005, and correspond to rcp26, rcp60 and rcp85 from 2006-2299.
Daily wind components at 250hPa and 850hPa	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Uncorrected daily wind components at 250hPa and 850hPa on original GCM grid for the GCMs: GFDL-ESM2M (1861-2100), MIROC5 (1850-2300), IPSL-CM5A-LR (1850-2300) & HadGEM-ES (1959-2299).
EWEMBI	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	The EWEMBI dataset was compiled to support the bias correction of climate input data for ISIMIP2b and the ISIMIP2a protocol extension. For a full technical description, see "Data source" below. Data is available for the time period 1979-2016.
Future, country-level population	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b	Annual country-level population, urban population and age structure (in five-year age bands) based on SSP2 from IIASA (population & age structure) and NCAR (urbanshare). Data is available for the following time periods: Annual country-level population (2006-2299), urban population (2006-2299), age structure (2010-2100).
Future, gridded population	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b	Annual global population data at 0.5° and 5' resolutions for the years 2006-2099 based on the national SSP2 population projections as described in Samir and Lutz, (2014).
GCM atmospheric climate data (Fast Track)	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP Fast Track	Daily-resolution, bias-corrected climate data from the global climate models MIROC-ESM-CHEM, NorES1-M, IPSL-CM5A-LR, GFDL-ESM2M, HadGEM2-ES covering the period 1950-2099 (historical run up to 2004, then split into 4 RCPs), downscaled to a 0.5°x0.5° lat-lon grid. For a full technical description, see the DOI link below (Hempel, et al., 2013a).
GFDL-ESM2M (ocean)	Protocol	Simulated ocean climate	ISIMIP2a	The ESM2M run is a fully coupled free running climate model forced by historical and future scenario GHGaerosol, solar boundary conditions without flux adjustment or other restoring to observations using TOPAZv2 as in Dunne et al 2013. DOI: 10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00150.1 Data is available for the following time periods: historical (1950-2005), rcp26 (2006-2100), rcp45 (2006-2100), rcp60 (2006-2100), rcp85 (2006-2100).
GFDL-reanalysis (ocean)	Protocol	Simulated ocean climate	ISIMIP2a	The COBALT run is as described in: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0079661113001079. It uses the same basic ocean-ice setup as Dunne et al., 2013 but is forced with reanalysis. Data is available for the following time period: historical (1959-2004).
GRanD reservoirs & dams	Protocol	Other	ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a ISIMIP Fast Track	This data set has been expanded with missing construction/commissioning years, see https://www.isimip.org/gettingstarted/details/75/ The dam data is based on GRanDv1.1 (Lehner et al., 2011, DOI: 10.1890/100125), but adjusted to match the river-routing in DDM30. After 2010, the data has been provided by Dr. Jida Wang, from Kansas State University (KSU). Use of these data sets is recommended but, if unfeasible, groups may use their default dataset. For a comparison of this dataset with the default WaterGAP and LPJmL datasets, see https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=d966db9c7b2949ac8380458d7020adf9
GSWP3	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP3a ISIMIP2a	Daily-resolution observed climate data on a global (land and ocean) 0.5°x0.5° lat-lon grid from the Global Soil Wetness Project Phase 3 (GSWP3), based on the reanalysis data set 20CR and using the bias targets GPCC, GPCP, CPC-Unified, CRU and SRB. The data set covers the period 1901‐2010. For more information about GSWP3's scope, experiment design, framework, etc. see https://www.isimip.org/documents/405/GSWP3.forcing.HyungjunKim20140306.HJKIM.pdf
Historical country-level Gross Domestic Product (GDP)	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a	Annual country-level GDP data for 1850-2016.
Historical observed climate data	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2a	Daily-resolution observed climate data on a global (land and ocean) 0.5°x0.5° lat-lon grid. GSWP3 Derived from the Global Soil Wetness Project Phase 3 (GSWP3), based on the reanalysis data set 20CR and using the bias targets GPCC, GPCP, CPC-Unified, CRU and SRB. This data set covers the period 1901‐2010. GSWP3-EWEMBI EWEMBI global meteorological forcing data processed for ISIMIP2a (http://doi.org/10.5880/pik.2019.004). Contains EWEMBI data and data from the GSWP3 dataset, developed by Hyungjun Kim with support by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI (16H06291). This data set covers the period 1979-2016. GSWP3-W5E5 W5E5 global meteorological forcing data processed for ISIMIP2a/ISIMIP3a (http://doi.org/10.5880/pik.2019.023). Contains W5E5 data and data from the GSWP3 dataset, developed by Hyungjun Kim with support by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI (16H06291). This data set covers the period 1979-2016. PGMFD v2.1 (Princeton) Derived from the Terrestrial Hydrology Group at Princeton University, based on the reanalysis data set NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis I and using the bias targets CRU, SRB, TRMM, GPCP & WMO and validated against GSWP2. This data set covers the period 1901‐2012. WATCH (WFD) Derived from the WATCH Project, based on the reanalysis data set ERA-40 and using the bias target GPCC. The data set covers the period 1901‐2001. WATCH-WFDEI Based on the reanalysis data set ERA-Interim and using the bias target GPCC. The data set covers the period 1901‐2012, where the data for 1901-1978 are taken from WFD, and from 1979 onwards from WFDEI.GPCC
Historical, gridded land use (HYDE 3.2)	Protocol	Land use	ISIMIP2b	Historical land-use (LU) changes from the HYDE3.2 data (Klein Goldewijk, 2016) (see Figure 3). Data for the time period 1861-2005.
Historical, gridded land-use (MIRCA)	Protocol	Land use	ISIMIP Fast Track	Harvested areas based on the MIRCA data set, covering irrigated and rainfed landuse.
Historical, gridded population	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP2b	Annual global population data at 0.5° and 5' resolutions for the years 1861-2005 on a 0.5° and 5' grid.
IPSL-CM5A-LR (ocean)	Protocol	Simulated ocean climate	ISIMIP2a	Ocean data from the GCM IPSL-CM5A-LR. Data is available for the following time periods: historical (1950-2005), rcp26 (2006-2100), rcp45 (2006-2100), rcp60 (2006-2100), rcp85 (2006-2100).
MIROC5	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Pre-industrial (1661-1860), historical (1861-2005), future (RCP2.6 (2006-2100), RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 (2006-2099)) and extended-future (RCP2.6, 2100-2299) conditions provided based on CMIP5 output from MIROC5.
N-Fertilizer	Protocol	Other human influences	ISIMIP3a ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a	We provide the fertilization rate per our five canonical crop types, i.e. for both annual and perennial C3 and C4 crops, as well as for nitrogen fixing crops. The variables’ names are fertl_c3ann, fertl_c3per, fertl_c4ann, fertl_c4per and fert_c3nfx. The data are provided on an annual times step on the land surface of a global 0.5° × 0.5° grid. The units are kilograms per year and per hectare. ISIMIP2a/ISIMIP2b: Data is available for the following time periods: historical (1861-2005), rcp26soc+rcp60soc (2006-2099) (see below for detailed information). ISIMIP3a: Data is available for the time period: historical (1860-2018).
Nitrogen deposition	Protocol	Other human influences	ISIMIP3a ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a	ISIMIP2a/ISIMIP3a: Monthly, 0.5° gridded data for 1860-2016. ISIMIP2b: Annual and monthly, 0.5° gridded data for 1850-2099 derived from the average of three atmospheric chemistry models (i.e., GISS-E2-R, CCSM-CAM3.5, and GFDL-AM3) in the Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Model Intercomparison Project (ACCMIP) (0.5° x 0.5°).
PGMFD v2.1 (Princeton)	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2a	Daily-resolution observed climate data on a global (land and ocean) 0.5°x0.5° lat-lon grid from the Terrestrial Hydrology Group at Princeton University, based on the reanalysis data set NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis I and using the bias targets CRU, SRB, TRMM, GPCP & WMO and validated against GSWP2. The data set covers the period 1901‐2012
Population & GDP	Protocol	Socio-economic	ISIMIP Fast Track	Historical (1950-2009) and future projections (2010-2100) of country-level and gridded population data based on the Shared Socio-economic Pathways (SSPs) for SSP1-SSP5.
Pressure & wind fields (3-hourly)	Protocol	Simulated atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2b	Uncorrected pressure and wind fields at 10m above the land surface with 3-hrly resolution for the GCMs IPSL-CM5A-LR (1861-2299), MIROC5 (1861-2099) and GFDL-ESM2M (1861-2099).
River-routing network	Protocol	Other	ISIMIP2b ISIMIP2a ISIMIP Fast Track	DDM30 River-routing network data.
Sea-level rise	Protocol	Other	ISIMIP2b	Total climate-driven regional sea level projections on a global 0.5x0.5° grid. Projection is a combination of ocean dynamic sea level fields and steric global contribution from the ISIMIP GCMs, and the fingerprints from glaciers and the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. Tthe time-dependent fingerpints were generated by scaling a time-independent fingerprint (see Bamber and Riva 2010) with the respective global timeseries for each contribution. Uncertainty for fingerprints is only from the global timeseries. Data is available for following time periods: historical (1861-2005), rcp26 (2006-2099; HadGEM2-ES and IPSL-CM5A-LR extended to 2299), rcp60 (2006-2099) (See below for detailed information).
WATCH (WFD)	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2a	Daily resolution climate data on a global 0.5°x0.5° lat-lon grid: Derived from the WATCH Project, based on the reanalysis data set ERA-40 and using the bias correction target GPCC for monthly rainfall and snowfall sums. The data set covers the period 1901‐2001. Related website: http://www.waterandclimatechange.eu/about/watch-forcing-data-20th-century When referring to the WATCH data set, the following paper should be cited: Weedon, G.P., S.S. Gomes, P.P. Viterbo, W.J. Shuttleworth, E.E. Blyth, H.H. Österle, J.C. Adam, N.N. Bellouin, O.O. Boucher, and M.M. Best, 2011: Creation of the WATCH Forcing Data and Its Use to Assess Global and Regional Reference Crop Evaporation over Land during the Twentieth Century. J. Hydrometeor., 12, 823–848, doi: 10.1175/2011JHM1369.1
WATCH-WFDEI	Protocol	Observed atmospheric climate	ISIMIP2a	Daily-resolution observed climate data on a global (land only) 0.5°x0.5° lat-lon grid, based on the reanalysis data sets ERA-40 (for WATCH) and ERA-Interim (for WFDEI) and using the bias correction target GPCC for monthly rainfall and snowfall sums. The data set covers the period 1901‐2012, where the data for 1901-1978 are taken from WATCH, and from 1979 onwards from WFDEI.
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Input Data & Bias Correction

Input data:

Bias correction:

Availability of ISIMIP2b input data:

Input data changelog