- The USGS is going to award 15 grants up to $500k for high res elevation and orthoimagery data.
- This will eventually be supplied to the public as part of the National Map.
- The private sector and federal agencies are not eligible. The deadline is December 1, 2009.
The USGS announced last week that they intend to award up to 15 grants for the collection and processing of high resolution elevation data and orthoimagery. The latter being leaf-0ff. This funding is part of the ARRA – American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 – good to see. Federal agencies and the private sector are not eligible. This data will be later supplied to the public as part of the National Map.
The announcement does not state that LiDAR is to be used, but it does say that the priority is for high resolution elevation data in coastal areas of the US prone to storm and hurricane flooding, earthquakes and coastal erosion.
I know of a couple of projects in the New England area that have been planned for some time and are ready to go, but I am afraid they would exceed the $500,000 ceiling. Perhaps the states involved can apply for separate grants and then coordinate to get the necessary overlap coverage.
Does anyone have any general rules of thumb that they would be willing to share that would provide an idea of what $500k of high resolution LiDAR would buy? The deadline for the proposals is December 1, 2009. Good luck.
