November SDRD Highlight: Devon Smith’s Modern Solution to Geological Data Storage

Since its inception in 1950, the Nevada Nuclear Security Site (NNSS), established as the Nevada Proving Grounds and later renamed the Nevada Test Site, has been a wealth of data for the scientific community beyond the eminent atomic and nuclear data. Geologic data gathered from various tests over the history of the Site have become essential to NNSS geologists and the greater geologic community. As these data sets grow in volume and complexity over time, thoughtful storage and ease of access become paramount considerations for current and future needs.  

In a fiscal year 2023 Site-Directed Research and Development (SDRD) project, principal investigator Devon Smith took on the monumental task of consolidating and curating the known geologic data sets over the life of the NNSS. Devon worked with fellow scientists Jacob Gochenour, Matthew Dietel, Andrew Miller, Maggie Townsend, Jennifer Larotonda, Carson Schuetze, and Justin Reppart, as well as engineer Yvonne Diaz and many of the 2024 Science & Technology summer interns.

Drillhole data is currently organized in spreadsheets by project. Some of the desirable data being curated includes location data, drilling data, and geology data (e.g., lithology, rock quality, physical properties, geophysics, etc.). Access to some of this data has been stilted by the retirement of a single user, one of several roadblocks encountered by the team. To add to the complications of the project scope, additional data sets were recently discovered, resulting in a need for data reconciliation to determine differences in the various data sets and properly vet the data prior to import.

During the February Science & Technology Work-in-Progress Seminar, Cleat Zeiler, lead for the User-Centered Remote Testing and Operations Science & Technology Thrust Area, highlighted the importance of Devon and her team’s work on the legacy data: “if we never test again, [that data] is what we have.” With over 60 years of drilling operations at the NNSS, the volume of subsurface geologic data is exceptional and needs to be preserved and organized. The goal of this project is to compile the data into a centralized database, preserving the data and making it accessible to our scientists and stakeholders.

To that end, the team has implemented several servers to house and catalog the data. Using the commercial software Datamine Fusion X, Devon and her team have already made significant progress. The project is in the second and final planned year in SDRD and looks to move into programmatic space at the end of the fiscal year.