Clemson Cooperative Extension Service has deployed the Clemson Extension Weather Network. This project was conceived in 2020 in response to the lack of weather data being reported in/around agricultural production. Of the 51 stations installed, 42 (82%) were close to a production area.
While the presence of weather data is critical for agricultural decisions, decision aids and tool kits will be the key to building climate resilience. According to the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, climate resilience is the ability to anticipate, prepare for, and respond to hazardous events, trends, or disturbances related to climate.
The Clemson Extension Weather Network (powered by WeatherFlow) provides real-time lightning alerts, custom point forecasts by location, real-time rainfall start/volume, and temperature. Forecasting and documenting drought, flood, frost/freeze, and other natural disaster events and effects on food system production will aid in building resilience to the food system. Once weather station infrastructure (stations and website) are completed, the aim is to build calculators and alerts that will help growers make management decisions based off of hyperlocal, real time and projected weather data.
To access real-time weather data around the state go to the following link: Clemson Weather Stations
