Open Access Data

The RDA is an open access data archive. Everyone, regardless of affiliation status--including no affiliation--can obtain an RDA account.

The majority of RDA data holdings are freely available to everyone without restriction other than the standard UCAR/NCAR Terms of Use.

Registering for an RDA account

Affiliation with an academic or research institution is NOT required for registration, but we recommend that you register with one, if you qualify.  Selecting an Organization Type and giving us the Organization Name helps us learn about our users, and may enable you to access restricted datasets.

Your Organization Type choices:

1. UCAR: Select only if your registration email address ends with @ucar.edu
2. University/College
3. Other Education: K-12 students and teachers, other education not covered by the first two categories.  
4. Commercial
5. Government: Federal, State, Local
6. Military
7. Public/Non-profit: National Labs, FFRDCs, NGOs, .org
8. Unaffiliated: Those who do not fit into one of the above categories.  We encourage and support citizen-scientists.

After you submit the registration form, you will receive a confirmation message to the email you used for your registration.  You must respond within 48 hours or else your registration will be deleted.  If you don't receive an email from us, check your spam folder.

If you forgot your password, select "Forgot Password?" and we will send a change password link to your email account on record.

If you already have an account, but have changed affiliations, log in to your RDA account using your old email address and the password you set up.  Then edit your profile to reflect your new affiliation.

If you no longer have access to that email account and you forgot your password, email rdahelp@ucar.edu with your name, your former email account and your new one.  We'll help you update your information and you will be accessing data again in no time.

Please do not create more than one account per person.  Do not share your account with others.  Doing so may cause you to be banned from our site.

In summary

• Register.
• Keep your registration up-to-date and accurate.
• We'll support you, no matter your affiliation status.