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Climate change science, data, and sustainability

Preparation

This lesson will be carried out using Google Sheets. The data for this lesson will be downloaded from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies’ (GISS) Surface Temperature Analysis v4. This includes the individual station data and global averages.

Step 1: Open a new Google Sheet

Step 2: Get the station data

NOTE: The rest of this exercise will use station data from Detroit Metro Airport; if you would like to attempt this exercise in a more self-guided manner, feel free to choose another station and follow the steps below.

  • Navigate to the Surface Temperature Analysis data explorer page. Read the description of the data at the top.
  • Use the data explorer globe to find a station with high-quality data that began collecting data before 1880 and continues to do so today.
    • Set From: January 1880, To: November 2021, and Dataset: GHCN V4 adj - homogenized and click Update
    • Explore the stations that are returned. What do you notice about their distribution? How might the global distribution reflect and perpetuate inequalities?
    • To get to the Detroit Metro Airport station page, either:
      • Zoom into Detroit on the globe (see figure below), hover over the station marker and click Generate Plot in the popup window.
      • OR using the Direct Station Search box, enter Detroit and click Search. In the results, click Detroit Metro Ap.
      • Explore the information presented in the Detroit Metro Airport station page.

Map and Search box demonstrating how to Find and open the Detroit Metro Airport station page

Get the data into a new Google Sheet

Three methods of getting this data into a Google Sheet are shown below. If you decide to use the Shortcut, please be sure you read through one of the previous methods.

Option 1: Download from the station data page

  • On the Detroit Metro Airport station page, under Downloads, right-click the word CSV in download monthly data as text or CSV, and choose to save the file to your local computer. The file will save as station.csv.
  • In your new Google Sheet, click Import
  • On the Import file box, select the Upload tab and select the station.csv file from your computer. Keep all settings at default and click Import data.

Option 2: Download from the station data page

  • On the Detroit Metro Airport station page, under Downloads, right-click the word CSV in download monthly data as text or CSV, and choose to Copy link or Copy link address. This will save the URL of the file to your clipboard.
  • In your new Google Sheet, double click on cell A1 (top-left) to edit it and enter the following formula:
    • =IMPORTDATA("https://data.giss.nasa.gov/tmp/gistemp/STATIONS/tmp_USW00094847_14_0_1/station.csv"), where the URL in quotes is the copied URL from the previous step. Click enter. All data will now appear in your sheet.

Option 3: Shortcut

  • Click on this link to create a ready-to-use copy of the data.

When you have completed the preparatory tasks, proceed to the exercise to get started.