15. Weather Regime plot

15.1. Description

The plot_weather_regime.py script contains the plotting portion for three scripts (elbow.py, Calc_EOF.py, and K_means.py) These were originally created by Doug Miller at the University of Illinois. A METplus use case illustrates how to use this plot.

These files are used by the image comparison test:

  • obs_elbow.png: Run “plot_elbow” in plot_weather_regime.py to create this plot.

  • obs_eof.png: Run “plot_eof” in plot_weather_regime.py to create this plot.

  • obs_kmeans.png: Run “plot_K_means” in plot_weather_regime.py to create this plot.

15.2. Required Packages

  • Python 3.6.3

  • Matplotlib 3.3.1

  • Cartopy 0.17.1

  • metcalcpy (see Section 1.1.2)

  • numpy

  • cmocean

  • psutil

  • pytest

  • pyyaml

  • sklearn

  • scipy

  • eofs

15.3. How to Use

Import plot_weather_regime into the script:

import plot_weather_regime as pwr

15.3.1. For plot_elbow

In the code, generate the following as numpy arrays (except K, pot_title, and output_plotname).

K: A range beginning at 1 and ending with the number of clusters used in the weather regime analysis.

d: A numpy array containing the differences between the curve and the line.

mi: A numpy array containing the location of the maximum distance.

line: A numpy array representing the straight line from the sum of squared differences for all clusters.

curve: A numpy array containing the actual values of the sum of squared distances.

plot_title: A string that gives the name of the title of the plot.

output_plotname: The full path and filename of the output plot file, a .png version will be written.

15.3.2. For plot_eof

In the code, generate the following as numpy arrays (except wrnum, output_plotname, and plevels).

eof: A numpy array containing the first 10 eof values.

wrnum: An integer giving the number of weather regimes.

variance_fractions: A numpy array containing the fractions of the total variance accounted for by each EOF mode.

lons: A numpy array of the longitude values under consideration.

lats: A numpy array of the latitude values under consideration.

output_plotname: The full path and filename of the output plot file, a .png version will be written.

plevels: A list containing integers of the contour levels used in the plots.

15.3.3. For plot_K_means

In the code, generate the following as numpy arrays (except wrnum, output_plotname, and plevels).

inputi: A numpy array containing the K means for the weather regime classification.

wrnum: An integer giving the number of weather regimes.

lons: A numpy array of the longitude values under consideration.

lats: A numpy array of the latitude values under consideration.

perc: A numpy array of the size wrnum containing the frequency of occurrence of each cluster.

output_plotname: The full path and filename of the output plot file, a .png version will be written.

plevels: A list containing integers of the contour levels used in the plots.

Invoke the plotting functions:

pwr.plot_elbow(K,d,mi,line,curve,plot_title,plot_outname)

pwr.plot_eof(eof,wrnum,variance_fractions,lons,lats,plot_outname,plevels)

pwr.plot_K_means(kmeans,wrnum,lons,lats,perc,plot_outname,plevels)

The output will be .png version of the elbow line plot, eof contour map plots, and weather regime map plots, if all three are requested. The output will be located based on what was specified (path and name) in the output_plotname.