The National Geothermal Data System was described as the "cornerstone" of the nations geothermal program for the next few years, by the Dept of Energy's geothermal head, Dr. Jay Nathwani, this morning in Washington DC.
AZGS is the prime contractor, acting on behalf of the Association of American State Geologists, on an $18 million project to deploy the NGDS across the country and populate it with state-specific data. There are 5 projects involved in NGDS, with combined budgets of $33 million
Jay spoke at the plenary session of the 3-day long annual Peer Review of the 200 geothermal projects DOE is funding.
We launched our project yesterday with a full partners meeting in DC. We have 46 states involved in "State Geological Survey Contributions to the NGDS." The big challenges in the next couple of months are is getting detailed annual work plans for each state in place and setting up preliminary web services to enable core network functions.