[geo-discuss] Fw: Free online access to Irish environmental data

[Jo Walsh]

This is heartening news, massive "free dissemination" of
state-collected geodata in Ireland... 

----- Forwarded message from Roger Longhorn <ral at alum.mit.edu> -----

Thanks to Darius Bartlett for the heads up on this from Ireland.

Kind regards

Roger Longhorn
ral at alum.mit.edu
=======

Ryan announces free online access to Departmental spatial data
?Natural resource deposit locations, licence areas & groundwater 
information now available online?

Dublin, 17 October 2007

Minister Eamon Ryan today announced that he would be making the bulk of 
the digital data held in the Department of Communications, Energy and 
Natural Resources available to people freely and easily online.

More than 5Tb of spatial data will now be made available for free 
download. These services will be made available via the Department?s 
website and the University sector?s internet backbone, the HEAnet.

Commenting on the announcement Minister Ryan said, ?The free 
dissemination of this data is intended to stimulate the environmental, 
exploration, construction, and geoscience sectors. Some of the data 
could prove very useful for companies exploring for oil and gas 
resources for example. It will also provide important data for planners 
in achieving sustainable and responsible development and assist in the 
planning of major infrastructure projects.?

The bulk of the Department?s spatial data is within the Natural 
Resources sector, and initial datasets available will include licence 
boundaries and drill hole locations from the Petroleum Affairs Division, 
significant deposit locations and prospecting licence areas from 
Exploration and Mining Division and a wide range of marine, bedrock 
geology, soil, groundwater, mineral and geotechnical data from the 
Geological Survey of Ireland as well as the Marine Institute.

Additional spatial datasets will come from the Department?s Engineering 
Division, whose coastal photos are collected for coastal protections 
work. The offshore datasets collected by the Department?s and Marine 
Institute?s joint sea bed mapping projects, the Irish National Seabed 
Survey, and its successor INFOMAR will also be made available.

?This project is an important component of an overall plan to make 
Ireland an internationally renowned destination for geoscience research. 
The Government has committed to investing a total of ?43 million over 
the next seven years in the geoscience sector and I hope to soon see 
many more exciting new geoscience projects that could potentially 
transform our lives,? concluded Minister Ryan.

ENDS
For further media information, please contact:-

    * Brid McGrath, Press Advisor: Office +353 1 678 2440 / Mobile: 087 
770 8631
    * Ken Cleary, Press Officer: Office +353 1 678 2441 / Mobile: 087 
905 9618
    * Email: press.office at dcmnr.gov.ie



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