Summary

The US Forest Service Pacific Northwest Region or Region 6 (R6) seeks to develop a complete and authoritative geospatial dataset based on authorized powerline facilities across National Forest System (NFS) lands for Oregon and Washington. The region includes 17 Units with both Forests and Grasslands. The goal of this project is the creation of a robust spatial database to support vegetation management planning, wildfire risk reduction, incident response, and compliance with new geospatial requirements for special use authorizations. Data used to develop this dataset will be sourced from multiple sources which include open repositories, data requests to electric companies, and internal Forest Service records. Multiple and varied sources will have duplicate features, various schemas, inconsistent attribution standards, and multiple geospatial data formats such as file geodatabase (gdb) feature classes (fc), shapefiles (shp), and KMZ (Google Earth) files.

Problem and Solution

Existing powerline facility data do not consistently align with special use permit records. This leads to potential gaps and alignment issues. File attribution will vary with some datasets that contain robust attributes like right-of-way (ROW) width. Meanwhile, others may lack attributes entirely (KMZ). Datasets will vary in spatial projections and coordinate systems from local project coordinate systems to projected, and geographic. NFS data are dispersed across various locations such as the agency’s T-Drive located in the Virtual Data Center (VDC), ArcGIS Online (AGOL), and the Automated Lands Program (ALP) Special Uses Data System (SUDS). 

Xentity started by taking the scope of current source data. This was provided by as many of the existing 220 powerline authorities, 20 power-related facilities, and the respective 70 utility companies that are presently available. Next, Xentity stores data received for this effort in a spreadsheet that captures the source data and condition. Then, Xentity uses ArcGIS Pro in the FS VDC/VDI to conduct spatial analysis. This ensures features are within Forest Service boundaries and determines if they include adequate attribution. Furthermore, Xentity integrates data from Special Use Permits when available. Xentity also created fields to capture information to identify and track the original data source. Then, Xentity developed a geodatabase. They also took part in data collection and aggregation.

Finally, in undertaking data gap analysis and data stewardship, Xentity provided relative PLSS location and gap analysis. Also, the removal of data duplicates. Furthermore, the refinement of metadata and schemas. Finally, Xentity worked to process new, incoming data.

Outcome and Benefit

Through Xentity’s efforts, the aforementioned authoritative geospatial dataset based on authorized powerline facilities across National Forest System (NFS) lands for Oregon and Washington will be developed. It will support vegetation management planning, wildfire risk reduction, incident response, and compliance with new geospatial requirements for special use authorizations. All of which are extremely important to forest management.