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Data from selected U.S. Geological Survey National Stream Water Quality Monitoring Networks
Author(s) -
Alexander Richard B.,
Slack James R.,
Ludtke Amy S.,
Fitzgerald Kathleen K.,
Schertz Terry L.
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
water resources research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.863
H-Index - 217
eISSN - 1944-7973
pISSN - 0043-1397
DOI - 10.1029/98wr01530
Subject(s) - geological survey , data collection , water quality , software , computer science , data quality , quality assurance , quality (philosophy) , data stream mining , database , environmental science , data mining , engineering , statistics , metric (unit) , paleontology , ecology , operations management , external quality assessment , mathematics , philosophy , epistemology , biology , programming language
A nationally consistent and well‐documented collection of water quality and quantity data compiled during the past 30 years for streams and rivers in the United States is now available on CD‐ROM and accessible over the World Wide Web. The data include measurements from two U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) national networks for 122 physical, chemical, and biological properties of water collected at 680 monitoring stations from 1962 to 1995, quality assurance information that describes the sample collection agencies, laboratories, analytical methods, and estimates of laboratory measurement error (bias and variance), and information on selected cultural and natural characteristics of the station watersheds. The data are easily accessed via user‐supplied software including Web browser, spreadsheet, and word processor, or may be queried and printed according to user‐specified criteria using the supplied retrieval software on CD‐ROM. The water quality data serve a variety of scientific uses including research and educational applications related to trend detection, flux estimation, investigations of the effects of the natural environment and cultural sources on water quality, and the development of statistical methods for designing efficient monitoring networks and interpreting water resources data.