dataset · Europe
Extreme precipitation risk indicators for Europe and European cities from 1950 to 2019
The dataset presents climate impact indicators related to extreme precipitation in Europe under current climate conditions. The suite of indicators include recent historic records, recurrence intervals, and other relevant statistical measures to evaluate the magnitude and frequency of extreme precipitation events. These are provided as gridded products, with one product covering the whole of Europe, and the other higher resolution product focused on 20 European cities that were identified as vul
Visit source ↗Source details
Licence: CC-BY-4.0
Evidence quality: 28.3
Listed in cds public catalogue API on 2026-10-16; relevance/value screened (haiku).
Metadata checked: 2026-10-14T13:20:00.000Z
What's in it
- Data offered docs-verified
- maximum 1-day precipitation · maximum 5-day precipitation · number of consecutive wet days · number of precipitation days exceeding 20 mm · number of precipitation days exceeding fixed percentiles (90th, 95th, 99th) · number of wet days · precipitation at fixed percentiles · precipitation at fixed return periods (5, 10, 25, 50, 100 year) · standardised precipitation exceeding fixed percentiles · total monthly/yearly precipitation
- Coverage docs-verified
- Europe (gridded product); 20 European cities identified as vulnerable to urban pluvial flooding (city-scale product) · E-OBS 1950-2019; ERA5 1979-2020; ERA5-2km and ECA&D 1989-2018
- Resolution docs-verified
- Spatial: ERA5 0.25° x 0.25°, E-OBS and ECA&D 0.1° x 0.1°, ERA5-2km 0.02° x 0.02° (city product). Temporal: daily, monthly, yearly and 30-year statistics
- Update frequency docs-verified
- No updates expected
- Formats docs-verified
- NetCDF-4
- Access llm-inferred
- Licence CC-BY-4.0 (per entry metadata). Free download is not stated in the docs; the Climate Data Store page shows Login/Register links, so an account is likely needed to download
Useful for
- Use cases llm-inferred
- Urban pluvial flood screening for a city drainage study using the 2 km city-scale daily extremes · Return-period rainfall (5 to 100 year) sense-check for drainage strategy design inputs · Historic extreme rainfall context and ranking of past events for a flood risk assessment narrative · Regional trend screening of wet-day and heavy-rainfall counts for climate-related flood risk work
- Audience llm-inferred
- flood consultants · drainage engineers · hydrologists · climate risk analysts · planners
Limitations
- Constraints llm-inferred
- No updates expected, and observational coverage ends in 2019 (E-OBS) or 2018 (ERA5-2km, ECA&D), so recent events are not included · Describes current climate conditions only, not future projections · City-scale product covers only the 20 identified cities, and its daily ERA5-2km data is available only for 1989-2018 · E-OBS is land-only, so coastal and offshore precipitation is not covered · Gridded products, not station data; point-scale design values need checking against local gauges · Downloads require a Climate Data Store account (login page present), and NetCDF-4 handling is needed
Evidence
- https://cds.climate.copernicus.eu/api/catalogue/v1/collections/sis-european-risk-extreme-precipitation-indicators
- https://cds.climate.copernicus.eu/datasets/sis-european-risk-extreme-precipitation-indicators
Check upstream coverage, uncertainty and licence before use. Station observations are not forecasts or design levels.