The Minerals Management Service (MMS) and Louisiana State University (LSU) have recently begun a cooperative effort to develop an oil spill contingency planning GIS database for the Gulf of Mexico Region (Gulf Wide Information System). The project has developed a prioritized list of data elements that will be included in the database. Data elements include biological resources at risk from oil spills in the coastal and offshore areas, coastal and offshore habitats, oil and gas infrastructure, infrastructure and facilities used in oil spill clean up operations, bathymetry, archaeological sites, water intakes, parks, wildlife, and recreational areas, and other features. A coastal base map is also being developed using 1:24,000 DLG data and other data provided by individual states.
Three aspects of this project are particularly noteworthy. First, decisions about the data layers that will be included in the database and sources of the data will be made by all participants in the project through a Steering Committee. The Steering Committee includes representatives from each of the states of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, from the oil industry, industry spill response cooperatives, and Federal agencies. The database from this project will, therefore, be considered authoritative by the regulators, resource custodial agencies, and industries that are associated with oil spills and oil and gas issues in general. Second, the database is being developed with regional consistency.
While individual states are providing much of the information that will be used to construct data layers, the Federal and industry contribution to the project will be used to augment and reformat data, where necessary, so that features match spatially across state boundaries, and are defined and described consistently throughout the region. Third, while the project will rely on Environmental Sensitivity Index (ESI) mapping to develop much of the biological data, data sources used to generate map symbols will be carefully documented, and captured digitally as funds permit. The objective is to have the data developed under this project serve as a step that leads to a more detailed database in the future developed from primary data sources.
Norman Froomer
MMS, Gulf of Mexico OCS Region
1201 Elmwood Park Blvd.
New Orleans, LA 70123-2394
Telephone: 504-736-2782
Fax: 504-736-2631