Minnesota Geological Survey is working with partners to build a statewide, consistent, standardized, and documented geochemical database, due to the convergence of: 1) systematic sampling & analysis of soils and stream sediments by the USGS & the MGS; 2) completion of a statewide till geochemical survey by MGS in cooperation with industry, and 3) renewed efforts by Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) to ensure optimal usability of their state ground-water chemistry data. The soil/sediment data are distributed statewide, were collected over a short period of time, and samples from each project were analyzed by the individual labs following consistent and documented protocols, while the MPCA water analyses were similarly rigorous. The following steps are underway: 1) Coordination of efforts by MGS & MPCA, to ensure production of an authoritative State geochemical database for soils, sediments, and ground water; 2) Preparation at MGS of available statewide soil/sediment data, coordinated with concurrent effort by MPCA/MGS on ground-water data; 3) MGS/USGS cooperation to clarify correlation of the soil data with the till data utilizing till samples submitted to the USGS lab; 4) MPCA/MGS effort to facilitate coordinated access to both soil/sediment and ground-water data; 5) web accessibility to the coordinated statewide database; 6) production of page-size monochrome digital maps as an atlas depicting elemental results in each sampling medium; 7) production of a document to explain the database; and 8) production of a color wall map to depict the major regional patterns.
Minnesota Geochemical Database
