NitroEurope Integrated Project (NEU IP)

This page is now obsolete. It is kept for information, as a record of what has been set up in terms of data management facilities for NEU during the first year of the project. The user should now refer to the NEU IP website.

Introduction

The NitroEurope Integrated Project – NEU IP for short – is a developing effort to coordinate European research on the nitrogen cycle. The project, funded by the Sixth Framework Programme of the European Commission, started on the 1^st of February 2006 and is intended to last 5 years. The science within the project is covered by the following six interactive project components.

Component 1. Flux network.
Component 2. Ecosystem manipulation.
Component 3. Plot scale modelling.
Component 4. Landscape analysis.
Component 5. European integration.
Component 6. Verification.

Availability of data

The NEU archive maintained at the BADC will contain data collected by the participants to Components 1 to 4 of the project. Data delivered by Components 5 and 6 (essentially maps), as well as the GIS data from Component 4, will be archived at the European Union Joint Research Centre (JRC), Ispra, Italy and will be accessible via the webpage of the JRC database on Agriculture, Forestry, and Other Land Uses (AFOLU) in Europe.

Access to data

(1) Public and restricted data

In agreement with Section 7 of the NEU Data Policy, access to the data will be restricted to the NEU participants and, on occasions, to some of their collaborators, during some retention period (*), after which the data will be released to the public. Conditions of use apply at any time to any use of the NEU data.

(*) The retention period is of 5 years after the data submission due date or 2 years after the end of the project, whichever occurs the first.

If you wish to access the NEU IP data archive, please follow the guidelines below.

Register as a BADC user — if you are already a registered BADC user, skip this step; if you have forgotten your BADC user ID and/or password, please contact the BADC helpdesk at badc@rl.ac.uk.
Apply for access to one of the following.
- Public data. If you only wish to access the public data, apply [Link not alive yet] for access to the public NEU archive. Access will be granted automatically once you have accepted the NEU Conditions of Use.
  Please note that no NEU data will become public until April 2012.
- Public and restricted data. If you wish and are entitled to access the restricted data (please check the NEU Data Policy, Section 7), apply for access to the restricted NEU archive. You will be prompted to abide by the NEU Conditions of Use and to enter a brief description of your research. Your application will be forwarded to the NEU Science Project Manager for approval. If your application is successful, you will be granted access to all NEU data (public as well as restricted). However, please note that if you are an external collaborator of NEU, depending on what your collaborative work involves, you might be granted access to only the data subset that you are interested in; if this is the case, you will not access the data via one of the NEU data centres (BADC or JRC), but the NEU Science Project Manager will put you in touch directly with the data originator(s).

(2) Where to find the data

Data and documentation supplied to the BADC by the teams involved in Project Components 1, 2, 3 and 4 (except GIS data) are stored in the BADC NEU archive from where they can be viewed and downloaded by authorised users.
Access to data from Components 5 and 6, as well as GIS data from Component 4, is through the AFOLU database at JRC, Ispra. If you wish to access those data, please contact Adrian Leip (JRC Ispra).

Data format - File names

NEU data held at the BADC are stored in NetCDF or NASA Ames format.
NEU data held at the JRC are stored in GIS format.

File names follow the NEU File Name Convention.

Instructions to data providers

Data file names
Data providers are kindly requested to follow the NEU File Name Convention. Note that the first component of the file name is the instrument (or group of instruments, or model) name. Please refer to the current list of standard instrument/model names and to the current list of standard location/platform names, and advise the BADC if your instrument, model, station or platform is not in the list, or if you would like to record data from several instruments in a single file, so that we can ensure that the lists of standard names are up to date before you submit your data. A file name checking based on this list will be performed at the time of uploading data to the BADC; files not complying with currently accepted standard names will be rejected.

Data file format

• Data from Components 1 to 4 must be formatted in NASA Ames or NetCDF. A format checking will be performed at the time of uploading. If you wish to check that files are correctly formatted before uploading them please use the BADC NASA-Ames format checker or the NetCDF format checker.
A commented Excel template in the NASA Ames style, as well as example files and instructions on how to convert Excel into ASCII, are available from the doc directory in the NEU archive: Help on NASA Ames for NEU.

• Data from Components 5 and 6 should be formatted in GIS.

Metadata
When inserting metadata in your data files (in the NASA Ames header or in NetCDF attributes), please be as specific, explicit and complete as possible, and avoid references to implicit or undocumented conventions. Metadata inserted in NetCDF files must follow the time variable.
All NEU data files must include the text of the NEU Conditions of Use. In NASA-Ames files, please include these in the first lines of the Normal Comments field. In NetCDF files, please include them as the comment global attribute – see the CF Metadata Convention, Section 2.6.2, Description of file contents. You can paste and copy this text from the Word version of the Conditions of Use available here.

Data file submission

• Data from Components 1 to 4 must be submitted to the BADC. In order to upload data files to the BADC, you first need to be granted access to the restricted NEU archive. To register, please see the "Access to data" section above. The NEU web uploader will allow you to submit data files to the BADC. Large amounts of files can also be submitted by ftp (please contact the BADC help desk for further information).

• Data from Components 5 and 6 must be submitted to the JRC. To submit your data to JRC, please contact Adrian Leip (JRC Ispra).

Supporting datasets

MetOffice MIDAS Land Surface Observation Stations Data – This dataset includes
- 3-hourly measurements of meteorological parameters from non-UK stations in Africa, Asia, South America, Central America, West Pacific, Europe and Antarctica, from 1974 to date.
- Daily, hourly and sub-hourly measurements of meteorological parameters covering 154 UK counties, from 1853 to the present day.
Signature of the NERC-MetOffice Agreement is required to access this dataset. Support in extracting subsets of this dataset (from selected stations or for limited periods of time) can be provided by the BADC help desk on request. Maps showing the station locations can be generated using Google Earth or GoogleMap.
MetOffice European Synoptic Stations Data from 1990 to 1996 – Hourly surface data from 141 European stations. Parameters include temperature, wind, rainfall, cloud cover etc. Signature of the NERC-MetOffice Agreement is required to access this dataset.

Documentation

NEU Data Policy (HTML) – also available as a downloadable PDF document: NEU Data Policy (PDF).
Conditions of Use of NEU Data (HTML) – and their downloadable PDF Version and Word Version for inclusion in NEU data files.
Metadata – general recommendations.
NASA-Ames data and metadata format.
Standards for the time variable.
Help, template and examples to format NASA Ames files for NEU.
NetCDF format.
CF Metadata Convention.
NEU File Name Convention.
List of accepted standard instrument and location names, and file name extensions.

Services

BADC NASA-Ames file checker
BADC NetCDF file checker
BADC NEU web uploader
NEU Data Management Workspace – accessible only by members of the NEU Data Management Committee.

Links to further information

NitroEurope IP web site.
European Joint Research Centre (JRC) at Ispra, Italy.
ESRI GIS and Mapping Software website, including documentation on the ArcGIS software.

Who to contact

Queries regarding the project should be submitted to NEU through the online form available from the NEU website, or sent to neu@ceh.ac.uk.
The NEU IP Coordinator is Mark Sutton (CEH Edinburgh) and his delegate is Eiko Nemitz (CEH Edinburgh).
The NEU Scientific Project Manager is Stefan Reis (CEH Edinburgh).
Queries regarding the data held at BADC (C1 to C4) should be sent to the BADC help desk.
Queries regarding the data held at JRC (C5 and C6) should be sent to Adrian Leip (JRC Ispra).

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