Downloading CMIP5/6 Models Datasets from ESGF in a Nutshell

This tutorial is applicable to downloading both CMIP5 and CMIP6 model output, and will cover on downloading from Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF).

This is aimed to serve as a quick guide to download global model output. For any other questions, please see the detailed ESGF guide, or reach out to fellow folks working with CMIP output (at UIUC or the developers at LLNL). Please take any suggestions provided in this guide as a grain of salt.

Workflow of Dowloading CMIP model datasets from ESGF nodes

esgfdownloadworkflow

  1. Login to ESGF-LLNL Node.

    • CMIP5: https://esgf-node.llnl.gov/search/cmip5/

    • CMIP6: https://esgf-node.llnl.gov/search/cmip6/

  2. Identify and Apply Search Conditions

  3. Identify Best-suited Download Method

  4. Proceed Download to Keeling



One-click Resources:

  1. ESGF User Support Documentation

  2. IPCC Standard Output from Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere GCMs (Table of variable names)

  3. CMIP6 Participant Guidance for Modelers

  4. Earth System Documentation(ES-Doc)

  5. (CMIP6 Data Only - with Jupyter Notebook Example) Loading CMIP6 Data from Google Cloud by Ryan Abernathey (See 2.)