In cder: Interface to the California Data Exchange Center (CDEC)

The R package cder provides a simple interface to the CDEC Webservice. Getting CDEC data with cder is easy, just pass a station code to cdec_query():

# get data for CDEC station NSL
cdec_query("NSL")

The CDEC web service uses some default values for the duration code, sensor number, and start/end dates. However, these default values vary from station to station, and sometimes a station will return no data by default. It's generally a good idea to specify these yourself:

station = "NSL"
duration = "event" # or "E"
sensor = 100 # electrical conductivity
start.date = "2023-01-01"
end.date = "2023-01-05"

cdec_query(station, sensor, duration, start.date, end.date)
#> # A tibble: 385 × 9
#>    Stati…¹ Durat…² Senso…³ Senso…⁴ DateTime            ObsDate             Value
#>    <chr>   <chr>     <int> <chr>   <dttm>              <dttm>              <dbl>
#>  1 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 00:00:00 2023-01-01 00:00:00  6015
#>  2 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 00:15:00 2023-01-01 00:15:00  6019
#>  3 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 00:30:00 2023-01-01 00:30:00  6075
#>  4 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 00:45:00 2023-01-01 00:45:00  6151
#>  5 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 01:00:00 2023-01-01 01:00:00  6283
#>  6 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 01:15:00 2023-01-01 01:15:00  6310
#>  7 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 01:30:00 2023-01-01 01:30:00  6360
#>  8 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 01:45:00 2023-01-01 01:45:00  6408
#>  9 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 02:00:00 2023-01-01 02:00:00  6425
#> 10 NSL     E           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 02:15:00 2023-01-01 02:15:00  6444
#> # … with 375 more rows, 2 more variables: DataFlag <chr>, SensorUnits <chr>,
#> #   and abbreviated variable names ¹StationID, ²Duration, ³SensorNumber,
#> #   ⁴SensorType

The web service supports multiple stations and sensors:

# get data for CDEC stations NSL and HUN
stations = c("NSL", "HUN")
# get electrical conductivity and stage
sensors = c(100, 1)
start.date = "2023-01-01"
end.date = "2023-01-05"

cdec_query(stations, sensors, "hourly", start.date, end.date)
#> # A tibble: 388 × 9
#>    Stati…¹ Durat…² Senso…³ Senso…⁴ DateTime            ObsDate             Value
#>    <chr>   <chr>     <int> <chr>   <dttm>              <dttm>              <dbl>
#>  1 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 00:00:00 2023-01-01 00:00:00  6015
#>  2 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 01:00:00 2023-01-01 01:00:00  6283
#>  3 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 02:00:00 2023-01-01 02:00:00  6425
#>  4 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 03:00:00 2023-01-01 03:00:00  6471
#>  5 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 04:00:00 2023-01-01 04:00:00  6230
#>  6 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 05:00:00 2023-01-01 05:00:00  5925
#>  7 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 06:00:00 2023-01-01 06:00:00  4668
#>  8 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 07:00:00 2023-01-01 07:00:00  3991
#>  9 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 08:00:00 2023-01-01 08:00:00  3700
#> 10 NSL     H           100 EL COND 2023-01-01 09:00:00 2023-01-01 09:00:00  4757
#> # … with 378 more rows, 2 more variables: DataFlag <chr>, SensorUnits <chr>,
#> #   and abbreviated variable names ¹StationID, ²Duration, ³SensorNumber,
#> #   ⁴SensorType

Certain CDEC stations may store non-numeric data flags in the Value column instead of in the DataFlag column, resulting in parsing issues. For example, flow data at SGN (Sugar Creek near Callahan) will sometimes use the codes "ART" and "BRT" to signify discharge at stages above or below the available rating table. cder reexports readr::problems() to allow you to view these parsing problems, and additionally writes the problematic rows to a temporary file to facilitate further investigation.

sgn = cdec_query('SGN', 20, start.date = "2022-07-02",
  end.date = "2022-07-03")
#> Warning: One or more parsing issues, call `problems()` on your data
#> frame for details, e.g.:
#>   dat <- vroom(...)
#>   problems(dat)
#> Warning: Parsing problems detected. Output written to
#> C:\Users\michael\AppData\Local\Temp\RtmpqOnwQX\file478447f97f36.csv
problems(sgn)
#> # A tibble: 1 × 5
#>     row   col expected actual file                                              
#>   <int> <int> <chr>    <chr>  <chr>                                             
#> 1    26     7 a double BRT    C:/Users/michael/AppData/Local/Temp/RtmpqOnwQX/fi…

That's it! The CDEC Webservice currently does not support querying station metadata. To browse station data, use the Station Search tool or Locator Map. These URLs can also be accessed by calling cdec_search_stations() and cdec_map(), respectively. See help("cdec-search") for more information.To access the metadata page for a particular station, use cdec_meta().