Own a weather station? We want your data
Weather enthusiasts are weighing how best to collect and share data from personal weather stations with public services like NOAA’s Citizen Weather Observer Program, which aims to improve official forecasts by ingesting crowdsourced measurements. Commenters compare consumer hardware (Tempest, Davis, Ambient, Kestrel, DIY ESP32/Raspberry Pi setups), focusing on cost, durability, data access, and integration with tools like Home Assistant and weewx. A recurring theme is tension between open, government-backed data infrastructure and commercial “Big Weather” platforms that heavily monetize publicly funded data, along with concerns about API reliability, data quality, and global options for contributing local observations.
Personal Weather Station Hardware
- WeatherFlow Tempest strongly recommended: no moving parts, solar-powered, very low maintenance in varied climates; praised local UDP stream and simple APIs, but unclear if fully usable without cloud signup.
- Davis (Vantage Vue / Pro2, sonic anemometer) viewed as very high quality and long-lived, but expensive and hampered by proprietary data loggers (some hardware changes apparently to block DIY loggers).
- Ambient Weather WS-2902/WS-5000 popular mid-range choice: under ~$200–$500, Wi‑Fi, CWOP upload, custom REST endpoints, but some earlier setups required custom scripts.
- KestrelMet and Netatmo mentioned as solid all‑in‑one options.
- Some interest in ultrasonic anemometers and compact Doppler radars; true weather radars are acknowledged as very expensive.
Integration, Software & Data Sharing
- Many users integrate with Home Assistant, custom scripts, Prometheus/InfluxDB, SQLite, Node‑RED, and Grafana.
- CWOP and MADIS are central to getting home-station data into NOAA; some stations or vendors push directly, removing user effort.
- weewx on Raspberry Pi is widely cited as a FOSS hub for ingesting station data and forwarding to CWOP and others.
Government vs Commercial Weather Ecosystem
- Strong criticism that commercial “Big Weather” firms get vast government data for free, then resell it with heavy tracking/ads; some have lobbied to limit public forecasts.
- Counterpoints: NOAA is not necessarily “extremely underfunded”; much private “proprietary” data is of limited value and rarely used in full numerical models.
- NOAA already runs programs (e.g., National Mesonet, commercial data pilots) to acquire non-government observations.
Data Quality, Bias & Forecast Use
- Concerns about low-quality or badly sited home stations (e.g., on hot roofs). Others note bias can be detected, weighted, and partially corrected statistically.
- Some say surface station density adds little where good data already exists; aloft observations matter more for model skill, with surface data often used mainly for bias correction / downscaling.
- Platforms like Weather Underground and others provide siting guidelines.
APIs, Reliability & Alternatives
- Complaints about weather.gov APIs returning frequent 500s, bloated responses, and opaque outages; others note ongoing migrations and infrastructure changes.
- Suggestions: consume push feeds (MADIS, text products), cache locally, and monitor NWS notification channels.
- Open-data aggregators (e.g., Open‑Meteo, meteostat) and national services (yr.no, Met Office WOW) are highlighted as fast, ad‑free, API‑friendly alternatives.
DIY, Remote & Niche Setups
- Several build ESP32/Raspberry Pi–based stations using off‑the‑shelf sensor kits, MQTT, and local databases.
- Some run remote solar + cellular stations and flood gauges; lack of official ingestion pipelines in some countries limits their broader utility.