This chapter includes sources for earth science data generally as well as sources for specific aspects of earth science not covered elsewhere in this book—namely, natural hazards, geology, soil science, and biogeography (the geographic distribution of biological organisms). Most atmospheric data, including most data on air pollution, is in chapter 6, although some atmospheric data can be found in the general-purpose earth science databases covered in this chapter as well. Data on climate, including indicators of climate change (e.g., data on receding glaciers or greenhouse gas emissions), is also covered in chapter 6. Data about hydrology, as well as some oceanographic data, is reviewed in chapter 7. Some additional sources for data about soil conditions as they relate to farming are in chapter 3.
Major Sources: United States
U.S. Geological Survey (U.S. Department of the Interior)
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) disseminates massive quantities of data about several aspects of earth science, both data generated by its own activities and data created by other organizations. This data is available through several different portals:
Analyses of the amounts of various chemicals found in the soil, in rocks, in water, and in stream sediments for tens of thousands of locations in the United States are available in the “Geochemistry” section of the “Mineral Resources On-Line Spatial Data” site (http://mrdata.usgs.gov). Other data sets disseminated through this site include the locations and other information about different types of mineral deposits, mines, and copper smelters in the United States and around the world as well as mining claims made on land owned by the U.S. government.
Data on volcanic activity can be accessed via the site of the Volcano Hazards Program (http://volcanoes.usgs.gov), which contains links to each of the five separate volcano observatories that gather data about volcanos in the United States—one each for Alaska, California, the Cascades, Hawaii, and Yellowstone. In some cases the most complete data is available only via each volcano’s respective observatory, not on the main Volcano Hazards Program site.
Data on the time, location, depth, and magnitude of earthquakes around the world can be found via the Earthquake Hazards Program (http://earthquake.usgs.gov). The comprehensive, searchable data in the ANSS Comprehensive Earthquake Catalog, also known as ComCat, is available 1900 to present. Large data files with information on the likelihood of various earthquake hazards at different locations in the United States are also available, as is detailed data on the estimated number of casualties from various hazards (shaking, landslides, tsunamis) generated by more than 22,000 earthquakes beginning in 1900.
The National Gap Analysis Program’s site (http://gapanalysis.usgs.gov) distributes data on land cover (the type of vegetation or manmade structures on a given piece of land), the areas where it is believed that various types of animals live, and protected land areas, with the goal of helping scientists and the general public protect important animal habitats. Data is also available for some aquatic habitats, such as lakes and river basins.
Thousands of USGS data sets can be found by searching Data.gov, the federal data catalog (see chapter 2).
Additional USGS data is available through both the EarthExplorer site (http://earthexplorer.usgs.gov; free registration required to download data), which provides access to data sets derived from aerial photography and satellite-based instruments, and The National Map (http://nationalmap.gov), which has spatial data sets with information on land cover, natural hazards such as floods and wildfires, conservation status, and a few other topics. Since the data available through EarthExplorer and The National Map is primarily spatial, these sites are covered more fully in chapter 26.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is one of the major providers of information about the earth via its Earth Observing System and associated Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS). Through EOSDIS, NASA gathers and disseminates a wide range of data on all aspects of earth science—everything from sea ice to monsoons and from land cover to ocean color.
EOSDIS data holdings are dividing among several separate data centers and “distributed active archive centers”—some of which are managed by organizations other than NASA—but the data held by these centers can be cross-searched using the Reverb tool (http://reverb.echo.nasa.gov/reverb/). Reverb offers several highly user-friendly search options, including the ability to draw a bounding box on a digital map and see all data sets available for that area. Other options include searching by a single date range or by specific months, days, and times in any year (e.g., data from the month of January, or from 9:00 a.m. on June 21, regardless of the year). Sophisticated users can even upload a shapefile (a type of file used in GIS software) and search for data contained in an area defined by that file.
Alternately, the data held by each EOSDIS center can be searched individually on the center’s own website. Many of the data centers have specialized interfaces to their data that allow users to visualize or otherwise manipulate the data they hold, an appealing feature for users who know which data center has the information they need. A full list of the centers and of the specific data tools they make available to the public is available on the EOSDIS website.
EOSDIS data can also be searched via the Global Change Master Directory (see chapter 6).
Environmental Protection Agency
Data on topics such as hazardous waste, air and water quality, and the release of toxic chemicals into the environment is available from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), by way of two major entry points. The Data Finder (www.epa.gov/datafinder/) contains links to EPA data sources organized by topic (drinking water contaminants, hazardous waste, etc.) The databases are generally not cross-searchable in this interface, so it is most helpful for users who want bulk data on a single topic. The other interface, Envirofacts (www.epa.gov/enviro/index.html), is more useful for patrons seeking data on a wide range of environmental topics for a specific geographic area or type of facility. It allows users to generate a list of facilities meeting certain criteria—for example, in a certain state or ZIP code, on or near a certain tribal area, in a certain line of business, or releasing a certain pollutant—and to view or download data on those facilities from many different EPA systems, including the Toxics Release Inventory (through which data is reported on the emissions of various chemicals from industrial plants and other facilities) and the Facility Registry System (which contains basic information about facilities, e.g., the owners of the facilities and their primary activities as indicated by their NAICS codes). Users can also look up facilities by name, if they know the specific facility in which they are interested. Data on public drinking water systems is also available through Envirofacts.
Major Sources: World
Institute for Environment and Sustainability (European Commission)
The Institute for Environment and Sustainability (IES, http://ies.jrc.ec.europa.eu/index.php), part of the Joint Research Centre operated by the European Commission, maintains more than a dozen data portals providing access to several different types of scientific data. These include the European Soil Portal, which, despite its name, also contains some data for soils in areas outside of Europe; the European Drought Observatory, the Floods Portal, and the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), all of which contain both current and several decades of historical data on droughts, floods, and forest fires in Europe as well as data about risks for these events; the European Alien Species Information Network (EASIN), which distributes data on the number and geographic distribution of invasive species in Europe; and the European Forest Data Centre (EFDAC), which provides access to, among others, data sets on the current and possible future locations where various tree species are likely to grow given climate change forecasts. Several more IES portals are covered in other chapters where they are most relevant.
European Environment Agency
The European Environment Agency, part of the European Union, distributes several dozen data sets about environmental issues in the countries of Europe (www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/data/). These include data sets about land cover as well as species distributions, habitats, and protected areas. The Agency also distributes data concerning air quality, air pollution, and water, which are covered in chapters 6 and 7.
Minor Sources
Global Land Cover Facility (University of Maryland)
Another option for accessing some satellite data is the Global Land Cover Facility (GLCF, http://glcf.umd.edu/data/) at the University of Maryland. This site provides access both to raw data from some NASA satellites (including Landsat, ASTER, and MODIS) and to data sets based on this data. These include data sets that use data from MODIS to identify areas where deforestation is occurring or vegetation is being burned (the MODIS Vegetative Cover Conversion) and that use Landsat data to create high-resolution, global estimates of the percentage of land covered by trees (Landsat Tree Cover Continuous Fields), for example. GLCF also makes available data related to the extent of natural disasters, such as Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the earthquake that struck China in May 2008.
European Space Agency
Like NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA, www.esa.int/ESA/) has a major earth observation program that uses satellites to gather data. Access to much of this data is restricted to various degrees (some data sets require only registration and a description of the project for which the data will be used; others require that the project be approved before data access is granted), but a few projects based on ESA data are freely available with no restrictions or registration requirements. These include the ATSR World Fire Atlas (http://due.esrin.esa.int/wfa/), which provides data on the locations of fires worldwide, 1995 to present; Culture-MERIS (http://due.esrin.esa.int/culturemeris/), which uses the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) to provide information on the density of vegetation; and GlobCover (http://due.esrin.esa.int/globcover/), which provides data on land cover.
ISRIC—World Soil Information
ISRIC—World Soil Information (www.isric.org, formerly International Soil Reference and Information Centre) is an international organization that provides data sets related to soil types and soil degradation. These include both data sets covering the entire world and others that are country-specific. One of the global data sets, “World Soil Profiles,” is a crowdsourced effort to gather and harmonize as many historic soil profiles as possible. ISRIC data is also available through the Global Change Master Directory (see chapter 6).