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Terms of Service

LCAT Terms of Use
  1. Acceptance of Terms
    Please read these Terms carefully. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Weather Service (NWS) provides the Local Climate Analysis Tool (LCAT) subject to the following Terms of Use (“Terms”). You must accept and agree to these Terms in order to access or use LCAT. If you do not agree to the Terms, you may not use LCAT. LCAT is offered as an enhancement to the services of the NWS; individual accounts may be terminated or suspended at any time, with or without advance notice, for failure to follow the Terms of Service.

    You can accept these Terms by filling out the Registration Request form. You also accept the Terms whenever you utilize LCAT. The NWS will treat your use of LCAT as acceptance of the Terms of Use. In order to be granted access to LCAT users must accept the NWS disclaimer as well as the following Terms.

  2. Description of LCAT

    LCAT is a scientific analysis tool that is designed to provide quick and easy access to expert-recommended data and methods for climate studies at the local level. LCAT* helps to:

    • Guide development of your answers to climate-related questions
    • Understand your local climate variability and its impacts
    • Know your local climate trends in the context of global climate change
    • Link weather and water events to climate signals
    • Provide your users with trusted scientific information

  3. *Please note that LCAT provides scientific guidance that cannot be qualified as or used in lieu of operational climate forecasts

  4. Registration obligations

    LCAT is intended to be used by technical users who have a good understanding and knowledge of climate science and scientific methods of data analysis. In order to be a user of LCAT, users must satisfy at least one of the following criteria:

     

    Be a NOAA staff member or other government partner of a NOAA office:
    Defined as encompassing specific government partners both local and national (i.e., DOE, EPA, USDA, DOI, etc) who utilize scientific climate information in the wide array of applications for their work.

     

    Be a member of Academia:
    Defined as professionals associated with a University and educational or research institution (i.e., NCAR, IRI, NDMC, RISA, RCCs, State Climatologist Offices, etc).

     

    Be a member of the Private sector:
    Defined as technical users from Private businesses who provide scientific climate-related guidance in consultation with their clients

     

    Be a member of the Non-governmental Organizations (NGO):
    Defined as scientific staff from NGOs who utilize environmental information in their public awareness efforts.

     

    Be a member of Public organizations:
    Defined as technical experts from local or national government entities in need of climate information for planning and guidance purposes. 

     

    Be a member of the emergency management community:
    Defined as encompassing public safety officials who serve as employees or contract agents of a government agency at any level (federal, state, local, tribal, etc.) charged with protecting the public from hazards of whatever type that are influenced by weather and climate conditions.

    In order to obtain an account for LCAT you will be required to provide information about yourself in the Registration form. You agree that the information provided to the NWS will be true, complete, accurate, and current. You agree to maintain and promptly update the registration data whenever changes occur so that it is true, complete, accurate and current. In utilizing LCAT, you agree to take the training available through the LCAT Learn system.

  5. Account Security and Passwords
    Each user must have an individual account. You agree that you are responsible for any activity that occurs under your account or user name. You agree that you are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of any and all passwords used for access to LCAT. You agree that your password is for your use only and that you may not give your password to any other person or cause the password to be distributed to other person(s).

  6. LCAT content and user conduct
    You understand that all information, text, data files, graphics/images, links or other materials  which you may have access to or is downloaded through LCAT is the sole responsibility of you as the user. LCAT output, including analysis plots and interpretation statements may be used at your own discretion. NWS will not be held accountable for any statements written or spoken either directly or indirectly arising out of the use of or results of the analysis from LCAT. Interpretation statements and help sections are provided for your convenience and can be cited directly; however, your personal interpretations beyond those provided by LCAT cannot be attributed to NOAA NWS. LCAT and its data may be used without charge for any lawful purpose so long as you do not: 1) claim it is your own, 2) use it in a manner that implies an endorsement or affiliation with NOAA/NWS, or 3) modify its content and then present it as official government material. You also cannot present information of your own in a way that makes it appear to be official government information. For more information please read the information provided in the NWS disclaimer.

  7. Privacy Policy
    Registration information about you is subject to the NWS Privacy Policy available at: http://www.weather.gov/privacy.php.

  8. Termination of Service
    You may request to terminate your account at any time. You agree that the NWS may terminate your account for breaches or violations of the Terms of Service, or for extended periods of inactivity (greater than 1 year*) at the sole discretion of NWS. LCAT is offered as an enhancement to the services of the NWS; individual accounts may be terminated or suspended at any time, with or without advance notice, for failure to follow the Terms of Service.


    *Please note that one year of inactivity will deactivate your account. You will receive an email notification when your account is near deactivation with instructions to take action if you do not want your account deactivated.


  9. Service Availability
    LCAT is designed to operate 24 hours per day and LCAT support operates Monday to Friday 9am - 5pm Eastern time. Your requests outside of regular work hours will be answered the next working day. There will be times when the tool may be temporarily suspended such as software or hardware upgrades, fixes or maintenance, or unexpected technical or security issues. Every effort will be made to eliminate unplanned outages, and those that occur will be addressed as quickly as possible.

  10. Changes to the Terms
    NWS may make changes to the Terms without prior notification in order to provide clarification or address policy changes. When changes to the Terms are made, NWS will post them and make them available on the LCAT website. You understand and agree that if you use the Tool after the changed Terms are posted the NWS will treat your continued use as acceptance of the updated Terms.
Revision Date: 10/14/2015