Pan American Climate Studies (PACS) Data at UCAR/JOSS/NOAA/CODIAC

The Pan American Climate Studies (PACS) Program is a United States
Federal Program in the 1995 to 2004 time frame directed towards the
goal of improving the skill of operational seasonal-to-interannual
climate prediction (with emphasis on precipitation) over the
Americas. Although the principal focus of PACS is on seasonal and
interannual variability on a regional (>500 km) scale, higher
frequency phenomena such as the diurnal cycle and the 40-60 day
Madden-Julian Oscillation and mesoscale phenomena such as sea breeze
circulations and circulations forced by orography, coastal geometry,
and contrasts in vegetation will be taken into account, as needed,
with reference to the maintenance of the mean state and in the
interpretation, diagnosis, and modeling of variability on the seasonal
to interannual time scale. PACS falls within the scope of the
U.S. Global Ocean-Atmosphere-Land System (GOALS) Program, but because
of its emphasis on continental precipitation it will also have a close
connection with the Global Energy and Water cycle EXperiment (GEWEX)
and its subprograms. PACS will encompass a wide range of activities,
including climate monitoring, modeling, dataset development, empirical
studies, and intensive process studies (field projects).