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Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) |
World Data Centers (WDC's) are designated by the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU), Panel on World Data Centers. The mission statement of the WDC system is: “Data constitute the raw material of scientific understanding. The World Data Center system works to guarantee access to solar, geophysical, and related environmental data. It serves the whole scientific community by assembling, scrutinizing, organizing, and disseminating data and information.” In the U.S., the World Data Center Coordination Office is managed by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences through its Committee on Geophysical and Environmental Data. In 1992, the EROS Data Center was designated as a World Data Center for Remotely Sensed Land Data.
The World Data Center for Remotely Sensed Land Data (WDC/RSLD) is located at the U.S. Geological Survey's EROS Data Center (EDC) in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The Center holds the world's largest collection of space and aircraft imagery of the Earth's land surface, including over 3 million images acquired from satellites and over 8 million aerial photographs, and is also a focal point for information about data acquired by other countries' Earth observing satellites.
Facilities include advanced data analysis laboratories, production digital and photographic data processing systems, and on-line access and ordering capabilities for EDC holdings and the land data holdings of other facilities.
The EDC also hosts the NASA-supported Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) for land processes data, thus providing WDC users access to information about a wide variety of remotely sensed data collected by NASA's Earth Observing System (EOS) sensors.
2. Types of Data Available Through the WDC/RSLD
Materials available through the WDC/RSLD consist of digital and photographic images of the land area of the Earth. In addition to the data themselves, extensive "metadata" (reference material describing the holdings), in printed or electronic form, are available to assist users in the screening and selection of data.
Among the data available through the WDC/RSLD are:
All requests for information on data available through the WDC/RSLD, the establishment
of customer accounts, or orders for products should be directed to:
Alternatively, users can use the EarthExplorer web site, which provides on-line documentation, query, preview, and ordering capabilities, at http://earthexplorer.usgs.gov, or the USGS Global Visualization Viewer (GLOVIS) at http://glovis.usgs.gov for selected satellite data. Information on data available through the EDC DAAC for Land Processes is available at http://edcdaac.usgs.gov.
4. Distribution Policy
Data at the WDC/RSLD are available to scientists of all countries at the cost of reproduction and distribution. This cost varies depending on the source and distribution media, and processing required to generate the desired product. Contact Customer Services for information on prices for specific products.
5. Data Acceptance Policy
It is the policy of the U.S. Geological Survey to accept data collections acquired by other organizations, the cataloging, archiving, and distribution of which would enhance their utility and facilitate their accessibility to the user community. Collections meeting this criteria will be considered and accepted based on (a) the future utility of the data within the U.S. Geological Survey mission, (b) the significance of the data to the user community, (c) the quality and condition of the data, and (d) the costs of preparing the data for archiving, cataloging, and distribution.
The U.S. Geological Survey retains the right to return to the contributor data that does not meet these acceptance criteria.
Conditions of the data transfer and subsequent distribution will generally be specified in a Memorandum of Understanding or other written agreement between the U.S. Geological Survey and the contributing organization.
Accessibility FOIA Privacy Policies and Notices | |