Classification in Climatology

Abstract

Few, if any, areas of geography rival climatology in terms of emphasis on classification. Indeed, it can be argued that far too much effort in climatology has been spent on classification exercises of questionable value (Hare, 1951; Wilcock, 1968). In 1969, Borgel listed 169 different climatic classifications that had appeared in the literature, but the general lack of Russian listings suggests that the number should have been substantially higher. Since that time, a variety of new climatic classifications of outstanding merit have been proposed. Examples include classifications based upon air mass frequencies (Oliver, 1970), satellite measurements of net radiation, vorticity, and atmospheric moisture (Barrett, 1970), energy balance terms (Terjung, 1970; Terjung and Louie, 1972), and daily insolation levels (Willmott and Vernon; 1980).