GLOSWAC is an interactive atlas that provides information about the spectral wave conditions at global scale. GLOSWAC goes beyond the standard integral parameters such as Hs (Significant Wave Height) or Tp (mean or zero crossing period). At any specified point, GLOSWAC provides information of the wave energy distribution in frequency and direction. This characterization is made using long-term spectral wave statistics.
The main product of GLOSWAC is the Probability Distribution of Spectral Partitions (PDS). This distribution is derived from all partitions detected from 37 years of spectral data from the ECMWF wave model WAM . The PDS allows also to derive and define spectral wave systems in objective statistical terms.
From then on there is a vast range of possibilities for deriving specialized data and applications. Some of them are available within GLOSWAC, but many others can be extracted upon request.
The most direct product is the marginal distribution of the Significant Wave Heights of the individual wave components. The overview of this is provided in a box-whiskers plot format where the central line indicate the median value, the box limits correspond to the 25th and 75th percentiles, the whiskers limits correspond to the 5th and 95th percentiles, and the red marks indicate extreme occurrences. From these series, also the monthly variability of each wave systems can be readily obtained.
Wind information is also provided for a more comprehensive analysis. Particularly in the form of a wind rose and also showing the seasonal wind variation at the site.
Other parameters of interest that will be derived in the future are wave age parameters, crossing-sea probabilities, climate variability indicators and patterns, global swell field domains, among many others.
