Developing a Science-based Natural Resource Information System

**Statement of Problem:** USGS provides natural resource information at
many scales, describing many resources, and intended for many different
types of customers, partners, and collaborators. This information comes
not just from Geology, but also from Water, Biology, and Geography. The
breadth and depth of our data create a genuine challenge for users: how
to combine the disparate observations and predictions to create a
comprehensive understanding of the current and predicted state of the
Nation's lands, in toto or in a specific area?

**Objectives:** Provide a framework of understanding and a set of tools
with which to (1) identify relevant USGS data for an area of interest
and (2) combine those data to understand what is known today and what
might happen in the future. An underlying goal is to improve the data we
provide by more explicitly building in relationships not currently
considered.

**Work Strategy:** There are two highly related aspects of this work:
the technical problems of identifying, getting access to, and displaying
data and the intellectual problems of combining data with very different
characteristics into a meaningful picture of current and future states
of the Nation's lands. The data access issues will in part be addressed
by data cataloging efforts underway now in the GIO. However, this
project needs to move beyond cataloging into data search and extraction
tools that permit use (rather than discovery) of data. At the same time
(and NOT waiting for solutions to the data extraction challenges),
subject matter experts from across USGS need to devise effective methods
of combining data. This will require that scientists learn the meaning
and limitations of each other's data, work with partners to understand
what types of questions they answer using natural resource data, and
work with a broad community to develop data combination strategies that
go beyond displaying single data types in overlay fashion. Do current
water quality data confirm (or not) mineral resource assessments? What
can we learn by combining energy and mineral resource assessments with
Biology's status and trends data? How can we use retrospectives of
change in land use and land cover together with changes in resource
extraction to predict impacts on habit related to future resource
extraction?

Actually getting this done would require (1) identifying and engaging
subject matter experts who are able to imagine and test linkages between
seemingly disparate data sets, (2) identifying one or more project
area(s) in which a broad range of USGS data are currently available, (3)
building partnerships with data management, search, and retrieval
experts in the GIO, and (4) committing resources from across program and
discipline lines to fund one or more pilot studies.

**Relevance and Impact:** USGS data and information already provide
essential underpinnings for land management decisions across the US.
This project will increase the utility of current data, by providing a
variety of analysis tools, and will improve the data themselves. Done
right, the impact should be nothing short of changing the way scientific
information is applied in the land management decision making process.

**Partnerships:** within USGS, this effort requires Geology, Biology,
Water, Geography, and GIO; beyond USGS, we need active partnership with
Federal land management agencies (BLM, NPS, BOR, Forest Service) as well
as NGOs engaged in influencing decisions on Federal lands, and we need
academic partners from many disciplines.