PyISD: A Python Package for NOAA's ISD Lite Dataset

PyISD is a Python package designed for efficiently accessing and processing NOAA's ISD Lite dataset. The ISD Lite dataset, a streamlined version of the full Integrated Surface Database (ISD), provides hourly weather observations worldwide. It includes eight essential surface parameters in a fixed-width format, free of duplicate values, sub-hourly data, and complex flags. For more information, visit the official ISD homepage.

Installation

pip install isd-fetch

Features

• Easy access to global weather station data with spatial and temporal filtering
• Support for various coordinate reference systems (CRS)
• Parallel data downloading for improved performance
• Flexible data organization by location or weather variable
• Comprehensive station metadata handling

Quick Start Guide

Basic Usage

from pyisd import IsdLite

# Initialize the client
isd = IsdLite(crs=4326, verbose=True)

# View available stations
isd.raw_metadata.sample(5)

         USAF   WBAN         STATION NAME CTRY   ST  ...      BEGIN        END       x       y                geometry
5416   172650  99999             ADIYAMAN   TU  NaN  ... 2007-01-27 2024-11-17  38.283  37.750    POINT (38.283 37.75)
1362   032130  99999             ESKMEALS   UK  NaN  ... 1973-01-02 1997-12-26  -3.400  54.317     POINT (-3.4 54.317)
4729   153150  99999              SEMENIC   RO  NaN  ... 1973-07-21 2024-11-17  22.050  45.183    POINT (22.05 45.183)
28589  999999  13855  TULLAHOMA AEDC SITE   US   TN  ... 1963-01-01 1969-08-01 -86.233  35.383  POINT (-86.233 35.383)
6422   268530  99999             BEREZINO   BO  NaN  ... 1960-04-01 2024-11-17  28.983  53.833   POINT (28.983 53.833)

Fetching Weather Data

There are multiple ways to fetch data based on your needs:

# Get data for all French weather stations
france_data = isd.get_data(
    start='2023-01-01',
    end='2023-12-31',
    countries='FR',  # ISO country code for France
    organize_by='field'  # Organize data by weather variable
)

# Access temperature data from all French stations
france_data['temp'].sample(4)

                     070200  070240  070270  ...  077680  077750  077700
2023-05-12 09:00:00    11.4    11.6    13.1  ...    19.7    19.7    16.5
2024-06-26 15:00:00    21.8    25.8    26.7  ...    25.8    25.4    23.2
2023-10-09 18:00:00    18.0    16.7    17.9  ...    22.0    20.9    21.8
2023-12-19 14:00:00     NaN    12.0    11.8  ...    14.6    15.7    13.6

# You can also query multiple countries
european_data = isd.get_data(
    start='2023-01-01',
    end='2023-12-31',
    countries=['FR', 'DE', 'IT'],  # France, Germany, Italy
    organize_by='field'
)

Spatial Filtering Options

PyISD offers flexible spatial filtering through the geometry parameter:

1. Bounding Box: Using coordinates (xmin, ymin, xmax, ymax)

geometry = (-2.5, 48.5, 2.5, 49.5)  # Paris region

2. GeoDataFrame/Geometry: Using any shapely or geopandas geometry

import geopandas as gpd
city = gpd.read_file('city_boundary.geojson')
data = isd.get_data(geometry=city)

3. Place Name: Using the get_box() helper function

geometry = get_box('London', width=2.0, crs=4326)

4. Global Data: Setting geometry to None (⚠️ use with caution - large downloads)

data = isd.get_data(geometry=None)  # Downloads data for all stations

Available Weather Variables

• temp: Air temperature (°C)
• dewtemp: Dew point temperature (°C)
• pressure: Sea level pressure (hPa)
• winddirection: Wind direction (degrees)
• windspeed: Wind speed (m/s)
• skycoverage: Sky coverage/ceiling (code)
• precipitation-1h: One-hour precipitation (mm)
• precipitation-6h: Six-hour precipitation (mm)

Station Coverage

The ISD Lite network includes thousands of weather stations worldwide: