Showcase Authors

Author(s): Ian Jackson

E-mail: ij@bgs.ac.uk

Affiliations: British Geological Survey, EuroGeoSurveys

Member Country/Participating Organization: UK, OneGeology, EuroGeoSurveys,

Showcase Description

Showcase Title: OneGeology and OneGeology-Europe

Showcase Description: OneGeology is a global venture to increase the accessibility of geological map data. Geological survey organisations from 113 countries are currently participating in OneGeology and to date 41 of those are serving geological data to a dedicated web map portal. The reason for the success of OneGeology since its inception in February 2006 lies in its four unifying goals: make existing geological map data web accessible; transfer know-how to the developing world; accelerate the progress of an emerging geoscience data interchange standard; use OneGeology to raise the public profile and understanding of geoscience.

The global project has spawned regional components and in Europe the European Commission, under its eContentplus programme, agreed to fund a 2-year, €3.25 million, 20 nation project known as OneGeology-Europe. This will move OneGeology forward faster and allow developments in higher resolution and applied data. It will also begin to tackle something far more intractable – the development of agreed geoscientific terms and their classification,

Team: OneGeology - 113 nations represented by their geological survey organisations. Plus several state/provincial surveys and 8 international and regional bodies (including IUGS, UNESCO, EuroGeoSurveys)

Showcase URL: www.onegeology.org.

Showcase Justification

Add value of GEO in general: OneGeology is benefitting from the profile and network of GEO. GEO has significantly raised the reach and profile of OneGeology and credentialised it well beyond the geology domain.

Add value of UIC: Providing guidance and linkages into wider earth observation actors.

Summit Themes and Focus: In involving 113 participating nations, delivering a dynamic web portal with over 200 national datasets and producing technical protocols OneGeology has also ensured the geoscience domain is contributing to the creation of spatial data infrastructures for planning and policy-making – something major global and regional bodies (including the United Nations and the European Union) have been advocating for some years. Its achievements are perhaps well known because the project has taken a practical "just let’s do it" approach and moved quickly beyond usually lengthy and difficult policy and strategy phases which have impeded other initiatives.

Cape Town Declaration: Crucial underpinning dataset with generic application

Global goals and assessments: Geology (and thus geological map data) is a fundamental underpinning dataset without which models of, for example, ecosystems, mineral deposits, groundwater, natural and anthropogenic hazards,or underground storage of CO2 would not be viable.

Filling gaps, ...: Prior to OneGeology's initiation in 2007 there was no system for providing web access to geological data worldwide. In the 2.75 years since it has built a network and team across 133 nations. In transferring know-how it has accelerated the progress of data availability and the techniques to do that across the world and the internet availability of that data has allowed many new users (for example in the diverse domains of oil and gas and education) to gain ready access for a variety of purposes.

Strong future GEOSS: Establishing and achieving a set of basic goals in a very practical way. A strong and persistent network determined to maintain and build on progress. Excellent communications and outreach.

Link to high-profile issues: Geology and thus basic geological maps are critical to resource and environmental hazard issues - and in particular the impacts of climate change. For example - exploration and assessment of mineral and energy resources; mitigating ground stability risks (landslides), or radon risks, understanding coastal erosion, and surface and groundwater flooding.

Cross-cutting nature: There are already well developed national linkages between geology and other disciplines (eg in the UK radon gas prediction between geologists, physicists, health professionals, epidemiologists; in the Netherlands geologists and coastal defence engineers; Denmark geologists and hydrologists). These and many other good practice examples need to be disseminated.

Capacity building: One of the major goals of OneGeology is knowledge transfer and it has achieved a significant amount already through development of cookbooks, on-line help, workshops and a novel "buddy system" which pairs up nations who need help with those who have the capacity to give it. Several less well developed nations already have their data on line.