Canadian historical snow survey data

In situ observations of snow water equivalent (SWE) from manual snow surveys and automated sensors are made at ~1000 sites across Canada in support of water resource planning for flood control and hydroelectricity production. These data represent an important source of information for research (e.g. validation of hydrological and climate model models), for applied studies (e.g. snow loads) and for climate monitoring. A data rescue effort in 1998 generated the first version of the Canadian historical snow survey dataset (MSC, 2000) which was subsequently updated in 2004. This update includes data to March 2017 and is provided as bi-weekly 0.1 x 0.1 degree grid box averages to facilitate research applications. Data for individual snow survey sites are also provided but exclude most data from Quebec after 1985 that have access restrictions. Information on data format and contact information for the Quebec data are provided in the "ReadMe" file.

Supplemental Information

Datasets documentation provided in ReadMe.doc file

Supporting Projects: Update of Canadian in situ historical snow survey dataset

Datasets available for download

• ReadMe.pdfPDF
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• LisezMoi.pdfPDF
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• Station_List_Minus_HQ-MELCC.csvCSV
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• View ECCC Data Mart (English)HTML
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• View ECCC Data Mart (French)HTML
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• Digital Object Identifier (DOI)XML
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• Nature and Environment
• ObservationMeasurement
• Snow

Additional Info

• Maturity Level 1 (46%)
• Maturity Level 2 (38%)
• Maturity Level 3 (22%)
• Maturity Level 4 (0%)
• Maturity Level 5 (0%)
• Maturity Level 6 (0%)

Field	Value
Last Updated	October 20, 2025, 02:50 (UTC)
Created	October 20, 2025, 02:50 (UTC)
Domain / Topic Domain or topic of the dataset being cataloged.
Title Title for the Dataset.	Canadian historical snow survey data
Description A description of the dataset.	In situ observations of snow water equivalent (SWE) from manual snow surveys and automated sensors are made at ~1000 sites across Canada in support of water resource planning for flood control and hydroelectricity production. These data represent an important source of information for research (e.g. validation of hydrological and climate model models), for applied studies (e.g. snow loads) and for climate monitoring. A data rescue effort in 1998 generated the first version of the Canadian historical snow survey dataset (MSC, 2000) which was subsequently updated in 2004. This update includes data to March 2017 and is provided as bi-weekly 0.1 x 0.1 degree grid box averages to facilitate research applications. Data for individual snow survey sites are also provided but exclude most data from Quebec after 1985 that have access restrictions. Information on data format and contact information for the Quebec data are provided in the "ReadMe" file. Supplemental Information Datasets documentation provided in ReadMe.doc file Supporting Projects: Update of Canadian in situ historical snow survey dataset
Tags / Keywords Keywords/tags categorizing the dataset.	Nature and Environment ObservationMeasurement Snow
Format (CSV, XLS, TXT, PDF, etc) File format of the dataset.
Dataset Size Dataset size in megabytes.
Metadata Identifier Metadata identifier – can be used as the unique identifier for catalogue entry
Published Date Published date of the dataset.	2018-11-30
Time Period Data Span (start date) Start date of the data in the dataset.
Time Period Data Span (end date) End date of time data in the dataset.
GeoSpatial Area Data Span A spatial region or named place the dataset covers.

Field	Value
Access category Type of access granted for the dataset (open, closed, service, etc).
License License used to access the dataset.	Open Government Licence - Canada
Limits on use Limits on use of data.
Location Location of the dataset.	https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/f57afb37-90c7-4ff0-a757-ba792a4f40a1
Data Service Data service for accessing a dataset.
Owner Owner of the dataset.	Environment and Climate Change Canada | Environnement et Changement climatique Canada
Contact Point Who to contact regarding access?	Government of Canada; Environment and Climate Change Canada, 1-800-668-6767, [email protected]
Contact Point Email The email to contact regarding access?
Publisher Publisher of the dataset.
Publisher Email Email of the publisher.	[email protected]
Author Author of the dataset.
Author Email Email of the author.
Accessed At Date the data and metadata was accessed.

Field	Value
Identifier Unique identifier for the dataset.	10.18164/cf337b6b-9a87-4ffd-a8e5-41e6498b1474
Language Language(s) of the dataset
Link to dataset description A URL to an external document describing the dataset.
Persistent Identifier Data is identified by a persistent identifier.
Globally Unique Identifier Data is identified by a persistent and globally unique identifier.	Yes
Contains data about individuals Does the data hold data about individuals?
Contains data about identifiable individuals Does the data hold identifiable data about individual?
Contains Indigenous Data Does the data hold data about Indigenous communities?
Portal Type Platform type of the source portal.

Field	Value
Version Version of the datatset	None
Source Source of the dataset.	None
Version notes Version notes about the dataset.
Is version of another dataset Link to dataset that it is a version of.
Other versions Link to datasets that are versions of it.
Provenance Text Provenance Text of the data.
Provenance URL Provenance URL of the data.
Temporal resolution Describes how granular the date/time data in the dataset is.
GeoSpatial resolution in meters Describes how granular (in meters) geospatial data is in the dataset.
GeoSpatial resolution (in regions) Describes how granular (in regions) geospatial data is in the dataset.

Field	Value
Indigenous Community Permission Who holds the Indigenous Community Permission. Who to contact regarding access to a dataset that has data about Indigenous communities.
Community Permission Community permission (who gave permission).
The Indigenous communities the dataset is about Indigenous communities from which data is derived.

Field	Value
Number of data rows If tabular dataset, total number of rows.
Number of data columns If tabular dataset, total number of unique columns.
Number of data cells If tabular dataset, total number of cells with data.
Number of data relations If RDF dataset, total number of triples.
Number of entities If RDF dataset, total number of entities.
Number of data properties If RDF dataset, total number of unique properties used by the triples.
Data quality Describes the quality of the data in the dataset.
Metric for data quality A metric used to measure the quality of the data, such as missing values or invalid formats.

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