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This is a Non-Federal dataset covered by different Terms of Use than Data.gov.

i04 CIMIS Weather Stations

Metadata Updated: July 24, 2025

The California Irrigation Management Information System (CIMIS) currently manages over 145 active weather stations throughout the state. Archived data is also available for 85 additional stations that have been disconnected from the network for various reasons. CIMIS stations provide hourly records of solar radiation, precipitation, air temperature, air humidity, and wind speed. Most of the CIMIS stations produce estimates of reference evapotranspiration (ETo) for the station location and their immediate surroundings, often in agricultural areas. The Department of Water Resources operates CIMIS as a free resource to help California to manage water resources more efficiently. CIMIS weather stations collect weather data on a minute-by-minute basis. Hourly data reflects the previous hour's 60 minutes of readings. Hourly and daily values are calculated and stored in the dataloggers. A computer at the DWR headquarters in Sacramento calls every station starting at midnight Pacific Standard Time (PST) and retrieves data at predetermined time intervals. At the time of this writing, CIMIS data is retrieved from the stations every hour. When there is a communication problem between the polling server and any given station, the server skips that station and calls the next station in the list. After all other stations have reported, the polling server again polls the station with the communication problem. The interrogation continues into the next day until all of the station data have been transmitted. CIMIS data processing involves checking the accuracy of the measured weather data for quality, calculating reference evapotranspiration (ETo/ETr) and other intermediate parameters, flagging measured and calculated parameters, and storing the data in the CIMIS database. Evapotranspiration (ET) is a loss of water to the atmosphere by the combined processes of evaporation from soil and plant surfaces and transpiration from plants. Reference evapotranspiration is ET from standardized grass or alfalfa surfaces over which the weather stations are sitting. The standardization of grass or alfalfa surfaces for a weather station is required because ET varies depending on plant (type, density, height) and soil factors and it is difficult, if not impossible, to measure weather parameters under all sets of conditions. Irrigators have to use crop factors, known as crop coefficients (Kc), to convert ET from the standardized reference surfaces into an actual evapotranspiration (ETc) by a specific crop. For more information go to https://cimis.water.ca.gov/.  The associated data are considered DWR enterprise GIS data, which meet all appropriate requirements of the DWR Spatial Data Standards, specifically the DWR Spatial Data Standard version 3.3, dated April 13, 2022. DWR makes no warranties or guarantees —either expressed or implied — as to the completeness, accuracy, or correctness of the data. DWR neither accepts nor assumes liability arising from or for any incorrect, incomplete, or misleading subject data. Comments, problems, improvements, updates, or suggestions should be forwarded to GIS@water.ca.gov.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. Non-Federal: This dataset is covered by different Terms of Use than Data.gov. License: See this page for license information.

Downloads & Resources

Dates

Metadata Created Date July 23, 2025
Metadata Updated Date July 24, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from State of California

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date July 23, 2025
Metadata Updated Date July 24, 2025
Publisher California Department of Water Resources
Maintainer
Identifier ac0802e3-30eb-4dab-9797-6b7eb60ae746
Data First Published 2023-02-07T00:28:44.000Z
Data Last Modified 2025-05-29T16:08:19.000Z
Category Natural Resources, Water
Public Access Level public
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Datagov Dedupe Retained 20250724164837
Harvest Object Id c56be8db-9f2e-43d7-861f-2e4bf61a3745
Harvest Source Id 3ba8a0c1-5dc2-4897-940f-81922d3cf8bc
Harvest Source Title State of California
License http://www.opendefinition.org/licenses/cc-by
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 40c42340ecca969fcfc0c44cb06008126b55538ffcb3de0159ab968995386975
Source Schema Version 1.1

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