The dataset is covering the period from 5 Nov 2015 until 7 Apr 2016 (status on 11 Apr 2016).

MARS

If you have access to ECMWF systems you can retrieve test data from MARS archive using keywords:

class=mc
expver=0067

WebAPI service

If you don't have access to ECMWF computers but would still like to access a large subset of test data to validate your systems you can use ECMWF WebAPI service.

Read documentation and see brief request syntax of the ECMWF WebAPI service.

If you haven't done it yet you will need to create an ECMWF web account and accept the data licence.

Examples

Total aerosol optical depth at 550 nm in NetCDF format, only European domain, all the available steps, December 2015

GRIB
#!/usr/bin/env python
from ecmwfapi import ECMWFDataServer
server = ECMWFDataServer()

server.retrieve({
    "dataset": "cams_nrealtime_test",
    "stream": "oper",
    "type": "fc",
    "date": "20151201/to/20151231",
    "time": "00",    
    "step":"0/to/120/by/1",
    "levtype":"sfc",
    "param" : "aod550",       # see parameter table at http://macc.copernicus-atmosphere.eu/oper_info/global_nrt_data_access/ftp/20150911_cams_upgrade/
    "grid": "0.4/0.4",        # 0.4 x 0.4 regular lat-lon grid
    "area": "70/-35/35/60",   # N/E/S/W area boundaries
    "target": "/tmp/cams_nrealtime_201512.grib"
})
NetCDF
#!/usr/bin/env python
from ecmwfapi import ECMWFDataServer
server = ECMWFDataServer()

for i in range(1,31):
    date = "201512%02d" % i
    server.retrieve({
    "dataset": "cams_nrealtime_test",
    "stream": "oper",
    "type": "fc",
    "date": date,
    "time": "00",    
    "step":"0/to/120/by/1",
    "levtype":"sfc",
    "param" : "aod550",       # see parameter table at http://macc.copernicus-atmosphere.eu/oper_info/global_nrt_data_access/ftp/20150911_cams_upgrade/
    "grid": "0.4/0.4",        # 0.4 x 0.4 regular lat-lon grid
    "area": "70/-35/35/60",   # N/E/S/W area boundaries
    "format": "netcdf",
    "target": "/tmp/cams_nrealtime_%s.nc" % date
})

ECPDS dissemination

The test dataset is available through operational ECPDS dissemination.

/DATA/CAMS_NREALTIME_TEST

The list of parameters is the same as in the current global data stream but at the higher 0.4 deg horizontal resolution.

If everything else fails ...

... you can always contact us by using this contact form putting "Request for CAMS global test dataset" as a subject and specify:

  • which parameters and levels
  • which time period
  • forecast step / time frequency
  • which geographical area
  • which data format you require