Self-Calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index (sc-PDSI)
Index name: Self-Calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index (sc-PDSI).
Ease of use: Yellow.
Origins: Initial work was conducted at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln by Wells et al. in the early 2000s.
Characteristics: Accounts for all the constants contained in the PDSI and includes a methodology in which the constants are calculated dynamically based upon the characteristics present at each station location. The self-calibrating nature of sc-PDSI is developed for each station and changes based upon the climate regime of the location. It has wet and dry scales.
Input parameters: Monthly temperature and precipitation. Information on the water-holding capacity of soils can be used, but defaults are also available. A serially complete record of temperature and precipitation data is required.
Applications: Can be applied to meteorological, agricultural and hydrological drought situations. With the results being tied directly to station location, extreme events are rare, as they are related directly to that station’s information and not a constant.
Strengths: With the calculations for sc-PDSI accounting for each individual location, the index reflects what is happening at each site and allows for more accurate comparisons between regions. Different time steps can be calculated.
Weaknesses: As the methodology is not significantly different from PDSI, it has the same issues in terms of time lag and frozen precipitation and frozen soils.
Resources: The code can be obtained from the National Drought Mitigation Center (NDMC). The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) has developed the CRU SC-PDSI (Self-Calibrating PDSI) over Europe & North America tool.
Reference: Wells, N., S. Goddard and M.J. Hayes, 2004: A self-calibrating Palmer Drought Severity Index. Journal of Climate, 17: 2335–2351. DOI: 10.1175/1520-0442(2004)017<2335:ASPDSI>2.0.CO;2.
17 Responses
Sorry, could you please tell me about the R software package for (sc)PDSI calculation given earlier (for example, https://www.rdocumentation.org/packages/scPDSI/versions/0.1.3/topics/pdsi). You only need to provide P and PE and adjust AWC. Is it correct to be able to calculate scPDSI ?
Dear Brook,
Thanks a lot for your request. Yes, that is true!
Kind regards,
Valentin from the
IDMP TSU
There is no code in the code link, may I ask where I can get the code?
Dear Kim
The code to the sc-PDSI and other indices can be obtained here: https://www.drought.gov/data-maps-tools/climate-and-drought-indices-python-spi-spei-pet. The codes are in Phython. You can also find R packages for (sc)PDSI calculation (e.g. https://www.rdocumentation.org/packages/scPDSI/versions/0.1.3/topics/pdsi).
Best regards
IDMP TSU
hello, how can i calculate Pdsi? which program can i use?
Dear Gaye
Thank you for your question. The development of the PDSI is explained in the following publication: https://www.droughtmanagement.info/literature/USWB_Meteorological_Drought_1965.pdf.
There are R packages available to calculate PDSI, for example this one: https://cran.microsoft.com/snapshot/2020-04-20/web/packages/scPDSI/readme/README.html.
You can find some more information on the PDSI and its usage here: https://drought.unl.edu/archive/Documents/NDMC/Workshops/136/Pres/Brian%20Fuchs–PDSI%20and%20scPDSI.pdf
Best regards
IDMP TSU
Let me ask you: what’s the unit of the Available Water Capacity, what’s the meaning of the unit and how to convert volume percentage to it? Thanks
Dear Veromca Roy
Available water capacity is the water held in soil between its field capacity and permanent wilting point. Water capacity is usually expressed as a volume fraction or percentage, or as a depth (in or cm). It is dependent on soil texture, as different particle distributions in a soil will lead to different soil porosity. In order to convert from volume percentage to mm, the total soil depth needs to be known. Please find an example of unit conversion here: https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/nrcs142p2_051279.pdf
Best regards
IDMP TSU
Thank you your contribution
Dear Nkem Ekpeni
In order to provide you with more information, could you please be more specific on what these variable names stand for and which tool you used to generate the PHDI values?
Best regards
IDMP team
Dear Nkem Ekpeni
The Palmer Hydrological Drought index (PHDI) is a modification of the PDSI to take into account longer-term dryness. You can find more information on it here: https://www.droughtmanagement.info/palmer-hydrological-drought-index-phdi/.
The Modified or Weighted Palmer Drought Severity Index (WPLM) is obtained from the sum of the wet and dry terms weighted by probability values. The WPLM has the same value as the PDSI during established dry or wet spells but can be different during transition periods.
Best regards
IDMP team
Here is
Pls, how do interprete, inter.vars, calib, coes after generating PHDI?Thanks
Pls, what is the difference between PHDI AND WPLM from scPDSI. Thanks
Pls, can you calculate scpdsi on excel
Dear Nkem Ekpeni
You can calculate the scPDSI using a special R software package: https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/scPDSI/index.html. The statistical software R can be downloaded and installed free from charge.
Best regards
IDMP team
I want to compute self-calibrated Palmer drought severity index over Congo Basin (Central Africa). It is possible for me to have the parameters. How can I consider inputs file. Please I need your support
Dear Steve Yvan Nono Noutchie
Thank you for your comment. Below you find links to the research paper on the method development of the self-calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index and to the source code for the method.
Research paper: DOI: 10.1175/1520-0442(2004)017<2335:ASPDSI>2.0.CO;2
Source code for sc-PDSI: https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/scPDSI/index.html
Kind regards,
IDMP Team