NLDAS-2 Mosaic Model: Monthly Land Surface Variables for North America

Thirty-seven fields of simulated land-surface data, including rainfall, evapotranspiration, and soil moisture, are provided at a 0.125-degree grid resolution. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) generated this data from January 1979 to the present using the Mosaic land-surface model as part of the North American Land Data Assimilation System. Monthly files are available in netCDF format, derived from hourly model outputs.

Use Cases

• Modeling long-term hydrological cycles based on monthly rainfall and snowfall accumulation fields.
• Analyzing land-atmosphere interactions based on monthly average surface temperature and radiation variables.
• Assessing water resource availability based on simulated surface runoff, subsurface runoff, and total evapotranspiration.
• Studying snowpack dynamics based on snow melt and snow-related fields.

Strengths

• Contains thirty-seven distinct physical variables for land-surface analysis.
• Data spans from January 1979 to the present, providing a long-term record.
• Spatial resolution is a consistent 0.125 by 0.125 degrees.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• The first month (January 1979) starts from 00Z on 02 Jan, creating a slight data inconsistency.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Simulated from the Mosaic land-surface model (LSM) for Phase 2 of the North American Land Data Assimilation System (NLDAS-2).

Time Range

Jan 1979 to present

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-12 23:27:47.500975; freshness should be verified.

Geography

North America at 0.125 x 0.125 degree grid spacing