MIDAS Open: UK hourly solar radiation data, v202407

The UK hourly solar radiation data contain the amount of solar irradiance received during the hour ending at the specified time. All sites report 'global' radiation amounts. This is also known as 'total sky radiation' as it includes both direct solar irradiance and 'diffuse' irradiance as a result of light scattering. Some sites also provide separate diffuse and direct irradiation amounts, depending on the instrumentation at the site. For these the sun's path is tracked with two pyrometers - one where the path to the sun is blocked by a suitable disc to allow the scattered sunlight to be measured to give the diffuse measurement, while the other has a tube pointing at the sun to measure direct solar irradiance whilst blanking out scattered sun light.

For details about the different measurements made and the limited number of sites making them please see the MIDAS Solar Irradiance table linked to in the online resources section of this record.

This version supersedes the previous version of this dataset and a change log is available in the archive, and in the linked documentation for this record, detailing the differences between this version and the previous version. The change logs detail new, replaced and removed data. These include the addition of data for calendar year 2023.

The data were collected by observation stations operated by the Met Office across the UK and transmitted within the following message types: SYNOP, HCM, AWSHRLY, MODLERAD, ESAWRADT and DRADR35 messages. The data spans from 1947 to 2023.

This dataset is part of the Midas-open dataset collection made available by the Met Office under the UK Open Government Licence, containing only UK mainland land surface observations owned or operated by the Met Office. It is a subset of the fuller, restricted Met Office Integrated Data Archive System (MIDAS) Land and Marine Surface Stations dataset, also available through the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis - see the related dataset section on this record.

Date (Publication): 2024-08-06T13:45:06

Date (Creation): 2024-08-06T13:45:06

Citation identifier: https://catalogue.ceda.ac.uk/uuid/0afba628c2f4462da68b0a81ebf1ff4c

Citation identifier: NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis / 0afba628c2f4462da68b0a81ebf1ff4c

Citation identifier: doi / 10.5285/0afba628c2f4462da68b0a81ebf1ff4c

Point of contact

Organisation name	Electronic mail address	Role
Met Office	enquiries@metoffice.gov.uk	Author
NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis	support@ceda.ac.uk	Custodian
NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis	support@ceda.ac.uk	Distributor
Met Office	enquiries@metoffice.gov.uk	Principal investigator
NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis	support@ceda.ac.uk	pointofContact
Met Office	enquiries@metoffice.gov.uk	pointofContact
NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis	support@ceda.ac.uk	Publisher

Maintenance and update frequency: Not planned

Update scope: Dataset

Keywords

Met Office
MIDAS
UK
meteorology
solar irradiance
hourly
global
diffuse
direct

GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0

atmospheric conditions

Access constraints: Other restrictions

Other constraints: Access to these data is available to any registered CEDA user. Please Login or Register for a CEDA account to gain access.

Use constraints: Other restrictions

Other constraints: Under the following licence http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/, appropriate use of these data may fall under any use. This message is intended as guidance, always read the full licence. When using these data you must cite them correctly using the citation given on the CEDA Data Catalogue record.

Spatial representation type: Grid

Language: English

Topic category

Climatology, meteorology, atmosphere

Begin date: 1947-01-01T00:00:00

End date: 2023-12-31T23:59:59

Unique resource identifier: WGS 84

Distribution format

Name	Version
Data are BADC-CSV formatted.

Distributor contact

Organisation name	Individual name	Electronic mail address	Role
NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis		support@ceda.ac.uk	Distributor

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://catalogue.ceda.ac.uk/uuid/0afba628c2f4462da68b0a81ebf1ff4c	CEDA Data Catalogue Page

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://data.ceda.ac.uk/badc/ukmo-midas-open/data/uk-radiation-obs/dataset-version-202407/	DOWNLOAD

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://help.ceda.ac.uk/article/4982-midas-open-user-guide	MIDAS Open User Guide

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://data.ceda.ac.uk/badc/ukmo-midas-open/data/uk-radiation-obs/dataset-version-202407/change_log_station_files	Individual station change logs for the UK hourly solar radiation dataset for v202407 (this version)

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	http://data.ceda.ac.uk/badc/ukmo-midas-open/data/uk-radiation-obs/dataset-version-202407/midas-open_uk-radiation-obs_dv-202407_change_log.txt	Change log for UK hourly solar radiation dataset for v202407 (this version)

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://artefacts.ceda.ac.uk/badc_datadocs/ukmo-midas/ukmo_guide.html#6.2	Information on versioning in MIDAS data

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://artefacts.ceda.ac.uk/badc_datadocs/ukmo-midas/RO_Table.html	Details of solar irradiance measurements within MIDAS solar irradiance

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://zenodo.org/record/7357325	MIDAS User Guide version v20200921

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/binaries/content/assets/metofficegovuk/pdf/research/library-and-archive/library/publications/factsheets/factsheet_17-observations_over_land_2023.pdf	Weather observations over land (Factsheet 17)

OnLine resource

Protocol	Linkage	Name
	https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12819432	Met Office. (2024). MIDAS Open V202407 release notes and station change logs. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12819432

Hierarchy level: Dataset

Conformance result

Title: Commission Regulation (EU) No 1089/2010 of 23 November 2010 implementing Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards interoperability of spatial data sets and services

Date (Publication): 2010-12-08

Statement: Data collated by the Met Office and archived in the Met Office's MIDAS database. Data are extracted from a sub-set of available tables and delivered to Centre for Environmental Data Analysis (CEDA) approximately on a yearly basis.

Metadata

File identifier: 0afba628c2f4462da68b0a81ebf1ff4c XML

Metadata language: English

Character set: UTF8

Parent identifier: Met Office MIDAS Open: UK Land Surface Stations Data (1853-current)
dbd451271eb04662beade68da43546e1

Hierarchy level: Dataset

Date stamp: 2025-08-20T02:27:07

Metadata standard name: UK GEMINI

Metadata standard version: 2.3

Metadata author

Organisation name	Individual name	Electronic mail address	Role
NERC EDS Centre for Environmental Data Analysis		support@ceda.ac.uk	Point of contact

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