Earth Data School
About
Full catalog/lis-tws-anomaly
lis-tws-anomaly·dataset

How Land Water Storage Differs From Normal

Terrestrial Water Storage (TWS) Anomalies
land NASA VEDA COG
In plain English

What it measures. Shows where land was holding more or less water than usual between 2001 and 2021, combining soil, groundwater, snow, and surface water.

How it's made. Modelled by NASA's Land Information System by blending in GRACE satellite gravity measurements, soil moisture, and vegetation data.

How & where you'd use it. Helps reveal droughts, wet spells, and shifts in regional water availability.

What's measured

listwsanomaly

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2002-09-01 → 2021-12-01
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90
  • FormatsCOG

What you can do with it

  • Track deforestation, fire scars and land-cover change
  • Monitor crop and vegetation health (NDVI/EVI)
  • Map how built-up vs. green an area is over time
Official description

Anomalies in Terrestrial Water Storage (TWS) modeled using LIS framework by assimilating GRACE TWS, soil moisture, and leaf area index over 2001-2021.

Get the data

veda_access.py
# NASA VEDA — open STAC API, anonymous (cloud-optimized GeoTIFFs)
from pystac_client import Client

cat = Client.open("https://openveda.cloud/api/stac")
col = cat.get_collection("lis-tws-anomaly")
items = list(col.get_items())          # browse the analysis-ready COGs
# open an asset with rioxarray:
# import rioxarray; da = rioxarray.open_rasterio(items[0].assets["cog_default"].href)
NASA VEDA is an open STAC catalog — browse and stream the cloud-optimized GeoTIFFs anonymously (no login).