[CF-metadata] CF Specification of Vertical Datums

From: Justin R. Davis <davis>
Date: Tue, 5 Apr 2011 15:38:57 -0400 (EDT)

Does anyone have any specific examples/recommended approaches of how to
specify vertical datums in CF-Compliant NetCDF? I don't see any definitive
explanation of how to do this in any of the documentation. ?I also see
where people have asked this question in the past, but there never appears
to be a final recommended approach.

Specifically, I'm trying to make sure that its clear that the "z"
(bathy/topo) and "eta" (water level) are being expressed relative to
either NGVD29 or NAVD88...currently the "CF Standard Names" for
"sea_surface_height*" mention only mean water level, geoid or
ellipsoid...none of which are really the same as NGVD29/NAVD88...and the
"depth" standard name has no other variants which look appropriate.

Previous discussion on this topic include approaches of creating a new
standard names (e.g. water_surface_height_above_reference_datum), adding
a new piece of metadata (e.g. reference=NAVD88)...but none of these have
made it into the "CF standard name" document or the CF v1.x Conventions.

Is there a specific recommended approach? If not, is someone working
on this?

thx,

jrd

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Justin R. Davis, Ph.D.
davis at coastal.ufl.edu
Research Assistant Scientist
Department of Civil and Coastal Engineering
365 Weil Hall / P.O. Box 116580
University of Florida
Gainesville, FL 32611-6580

Office: 352-392-9537 x1528, Weil Hall Room #551
Received on Tue Apr 05 2011 - 13:38:57 BST