The National Oceanography Centre Southampton (NOCS) Version 2.0 Surface Flux Dataset is a monthly mean gridded dataset of marine surface measurements and derived fluxes constructed using optimal interpolation. Input for the period 1973 to 2006 are ICOADS Release 2.4 ship data and the update from 2007 to 2009 uses ICOADS Release 2.5. The dataset is presented as a time series of monthly mean values on a 1 degree area grid. The quality of the gridded data is quantified by estimates of random, bias and total uncertainty. The monthly means were derived from daily estimates of each variable and the standard deviation of these daily values is also available. Click HERE for detail variable information. Users are advised to take account of the uncertainty estimates provided, and to note that in very poorly sampled regions, such as the Southern Ocean, the uncertainty estimates themselves may be unreliable.

Surface meteorological fields have been adjusted to account for varying measurement heights and for known biases (Berry D.I. and E.C. Kent 2009 BAMS). Surface fluxes have been calculated from daily fields of the surface meteorological parameters using bulk parameterizations.