National Digital Elevation Program (NDEP) August 2001

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National Digital Elevation Program (NDEP)August
2001
U.S. Department of the Interior U.S. Geological
Survey
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National Elevation Dataset
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Seamless/Framework Elevation DatabaseConcept
Assembly
Irregular Polygons
Conflation Update Tools
National Elevation Data Set Best
Available Regularly Gridded Multi-resolution
Mass Points Break Lines
Contours
Source Product Distribution
Grids
Raw Base Data
Control
Source Database
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National Digital Elevation Program (NDEP)

• In keeping with National Spatial Data
  Infrastructure principals, and Executive Order
  12906, establishing the NSDI
• Enhance Data Sharing
• Minimize redundant data production
• Leverage resources to satisfy multiple
  requirements
• Apply flexible and common standards
• Ensure availability of best available base
  cartographic data

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NDEP Partnership Mechanisms

• Joint Production Plans, developed by the NDEP
  Project Coordination Subcommittee
• Member Agency requirements
• Joint funding agreements with other Federal and
  State agencies
• Data Exchange, Data Share, and Work Share
  agreements with other Federal, State, and local
  agencies
• Innovative Partnerships with State agencies and
  private firms
• Existing partnerships, such as DOI High Priority,
  and the USGS-USFS-BLM Management Oversight
  Committee, among others.

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NDEP Membership

• Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
• Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS)
• U.S. Forest Service (USFS)
• U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
  (NOAA)
• National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA)
• U.S. Army Corp of Engineers (USACE)
• Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
• National Aeronautics Space Administration
  (NASA)
• National States Geographic Information Council
  (NSGIC)
• Other Organizations can be added

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NDEP Charter

• Presents Guidelines and Operating procedures for
  the NDEP Organization.
• Establishes the NDEP Steering Committee,
  identifying functions, authorities, and
  responsibilities.
• Charter signed by Members as of September 2000.
• Charter Revision, led by USACE underway.

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NDEP Organization

• Steering Committee
• USGS elected to Chair- Ken Osborn
  (kjosborn_at_usgs.gov)
• USGS elected to Executive Secretary- John Crowe
  (jcrowe_at_usgs.gov)
• Technical Subcommittee
• USGS Chair, Jim Mauck (jmauck_at_usgs.gov)
• Project Coordination Subcommittee
• USGS Chair, Dave Saghy (dsaghy_at_usgs.gov)

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NDEP Steering Committee

• Oversee the NDEP, including identifying the
  vision, direction, and goals of the program,
  planning and finalizing program requirements,
  determining general digital elevation production
  strategies, and reviewing product costs,
  contracts, funding, contracting mechanisms and
  resource allocations.
• Promote joint funding, cost-share and work-share
  agreements, and innovative partnerships with
  Federal and State agencies and other entities.
• Review and coordinate technical criteria for the
  program, including the technical standards and
  guidelines for the development, quality assurance
  and distribution of digital elevation data, and
  the assessment of emerging alternative
  technologies.

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NDEP Steering CommitteeContinued

• Meet semi-annually, or when called by the
  chairperson. Review the MOU and Charter annually
  to keep current. Update the MOU appendices by
  reviewing and approving the proposed Interagency
  Agreements and NDEP production plans.
• Participate in annual professional society
  meetings to provide general information, program
  status, and other activities of NDEP to agency
  participants and to potential new Federal and
  State members and contributors.
• Each agency has one voting member. Voting
  processes and procedures established by the
  Steering Committee.
• The NDEP Steering Committee membership will be
  comprised of agencies and organizations signed to
  the Charter and MOU/IA.

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NDEP Steering CommitteeContinued

• Annual consideration will be given to new
  leadership of the NDEP Steering Committee and its
  subcommittees, facilitating alternation among the
  member agencies. A chairperson will be nominated
  by the chairing agency and approved by the NDEP
  Steering Committee
• The NDEP Steering Committee will form a Technical
  Subcommittee and a Project Coordination
  Subcommittee to provide advice and support.
  Participating agencies will submit nominations of
  representatives to the subcommittees to the NDEP
  Steering Committee. The NDEP Steering Committee
  will select a Chairperson for each subcommittee.

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NDEP Technical Subcommittee

• The Technical Subcommittee will address technical
  issues related to
• research
• production
• distribution
• application
• Lead the implementation and or development of
  digital elevation data product guidelines, to
  facilitate NDEP operations.
• Significant technical issues will be presented to
  the NDEP Steering
• Committee, and specific technical guidance will
  be provided.
• Meetings will occur on an ad hoc basis as
  required. The committee may seek the input of
  and participation from representatives from
  commercial entities, academic organizations, and
  various levels of government.

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NDEP Project Coordination Subcommittee

• Coordinates requirements from NDEP members.
• Identifies overlapping, matching, or near
  matching requirements.
• Provides a mechanism for adjudication of
  requirements to facilitate joint data production.
• Develops and monitors production and funding
  plans.
• Addresses significant program issues, and reports
  to the Steering Committee.
• Fiscal Year implementation plans and schedules
  will be presented to the NDEP Steering Committee
  for review.
• Meetings will occur on a quarterly basis prior to
  NDEP Steering Committee meetings.

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Program Execution

• Modeled after the successful National Digital
  Orthophoto Program. (NDOP)
• Joint approach to products definition and
  contract administration.
• Consistent approach to quality assessment and
  quality control.
• Unified approach to providing archive and data
  dissemination services.
• Maintain archive of native data.
• Provide seamless data delivery over the WWW.

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Benefits

• Provides the mechanism for the NDEP membership to
  satisfy requirements for elevation data in
  support of Member Agency Missions, utilizing a
  leveraged approach to minimize redundancy,
  enhance data sharing, and pool resources to
  achieve common goals.
• Enhances the ability to satisfy a broader suite
  of requirements, from multiple perspectives, by
  contributing to a National Program which provides
  broader access to data, constituting a key
  contribution to the development of a National
  Elevation Framework.
• Provides the potential for a strong, sustainable
  National Elevation Program in support of National
  as well as place based requirements.
• Shows commitment to NSDI principals and executes
  the vision of executive order 12906.

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Meetings Status

• First NDEP Steering Committee Meeting held at
  USGS, Reston on Dec 11, 2000.
• Elections to Technical Subcommittee made by
  member organizations. Initial focus on
  standards/specifications, database/archive, and
  quality control/quality assessment.
• Joint meeting of the NDEP Steering Committee and
  the Technical Subcommittee held at FEMA on
  February 16, 2001.
• Technical guidance provided for subcommittee,
  work assignments and approach determined.
• Reached agreement to elect membership to the NDEP
  Project Coordination Subcommittee. Data Call and
  FY 2002 Program Call, initiated 3/16/01.

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Meetings Status

• Joint meeting of the NDEP Steering Committee and
  the Project Coordination Subcommittee held at BLM
  on May 2-3, 2001.
• Report on initial results of data and program
  call
• Discussion of development of NDEP information
  infrastructure
• Data Holdings
• Production Plans
• Program Requirements
• Production Management
• Process Overview  
• Status Reporting
• Identify Partnership Opportunities
• Develop Production Plans

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Meetings Status

• NDEP Steering Committee meeting held at USDA-FS,
  August 15-16
• Census Bureau joins the NDEP
• Subcommittee Reports
• ASPRS/MAPPS Elevation Conference Updates
• FEMA Cooperating Technical Partners Program
• MOU/IA Discussions/review
• Data Licensing/Data Access issues
• Intermap Proposals
• Consortia Commitments
• Public Domain
• Program Coordination/Data Sharing
• Promote fair Development of Markets and
  Technologies
• Cooperative business solutions