He contributed to the explanation of the dynamics of the jet stream and the analysis of data collected by radiosondes;[1] his preprocessed and quality checked datasets were widely used by other researchers.

The 1969 book by Palmen and Chester W. Newton, "Atmospheric Circulation Systems: Their Structure and Interpretation", is still used as lecture material in the universities around the world.

His nickname by students, friends and colleagues was Maestro and he was well known for his passion for cigars and interest of effects of weather on agriculture.

Palmen received the Buys Ballot Medal of Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1964.

By then, when more computing power was available and the first steps of numerical weather prediction were taken, the value of the work done by the Chicago School 10–20 years earlier was really appreciated.