Creating a serially complete, national daily time series of temperature and precipitation for the western United States

The development of serially complete (no missing values) daily maximum-mini mum temperatures and total precipitation time series over the western Unite d States is documented. Several estimation techniques based on spatial obje ctive analysis schemes are used to estimate daily values, with the "best" e stimate chosen as a missing value replacement. The development of a continu ous and complete daily dataset will be useful in a variety of meteorologica l and hydrological research applications. The spatial interpolation schemes are evaluated separately by interpolation method and calendar month. Cross validation of the results indicates a dis tinct seasonality to the efficiency (error) of the estimates, although no s ystematic bias in the estimation procedures was found. The resulting number of serially complete dairy time series for the western United States (ail states west of the Mississippi River) includes 2034 maximum-minimum tempera ture stations and 2962 total daily precipitation locations.