Check the Setup
- Python 3.10 or newer
- An internet connection
- The requests Python package
Microproduct Data GuideIntermediate
NOAA U.S. Climate Normals Station Archives
NOAA's maintained 1991-2020 station climate-normal archives for comparing typical local temperature and precipitation.
Report a ProblemAt a Glance
- Difficulty
- Intermediate — some data preparation helps
- Size
- Tiny · 0.02–0.06 GB
- Formats
- TAR.GZ, CSV
- Access
- Download
- API Key
- Not Required
- Provider
- NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
- Updates
- Occasional
- Last Verified
- Sep 28, 2026
- Source Type
- Government Source
- Python Syntax Checked
From Source to Product Signal
Test a Product Idea in Four Steps
NCEI publishes annual/seasonal and monthly v1.0.1 station TAR.GZ archives. Start with the Central Park monthly station CSV from the exact archive HouseHunter pins. A 30-year station normal is a climatological baseline, not a current forecast, and a station may not represent a whole county.
Access the Data
- 1.Read NCEI's Climate Normals product description and NOAA reuse notice.
- 2.Download the versioned monthly station archive.
- 3.Inspect one station's normal values and quality flags.
3
Run the Python Example
Install the packages, then run the notebook cell.
python -m pip install requests
import csv
import io
import tarfile
import requests
url = ("https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/data/normals-monthly/1991-2020/archive/"
"us-climate-normals_1991-2020_v1.0.1_monthly_multivariate_by-station_c20230404.tar.gz")
response = requests.get(url, timeout=90)
response.raise_for_status()
with tarfile.open(fileobj=io.BytesIO(response.content), mode="r:gz") as archive:
station = "USW00094728.csv"
with archive.extractfile(station) as file:
row = next(csv.DictReader(io.TextIOWrapper(file, encoding="utf-8")))
print(row["STATION"], row["month"], row["MLY-TAVG-NORMAL"].strip(), "°F")4
Test a Useful Signal
Inspect a Station Climate Normal
Compare one fixed-period station normal with a current condition without confusing them.
- 01Read a station's monthly temperature normal.
- 02Record the 1991-2020 period and v1.0.1 release.
- 03Explain why a station normal is neither a current observation nor a county average.
Dataset Details
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information is a government source. Last verified 2026-09-28. Temporal coverage: 1991-2020 thirty-year station normals, release v1.0.1.
Domains
Data Types
Tasks
Geography
Provider
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
Data Terms
NOAA-produced station normals are public domain; cite NCEI and retain period and release version.