The Electronic Geophysical Year eGY

1
The Electronic Geophysical Year (eGY)
An international program of scientific research
Emily CoBabe-Ammann1, W.K. Peterson1, Daniel
Baker1, Peter Fox2 and Charles Barton3 1Laboratory
for Atmospheric and Space Research, University
of Colorado, 2National Center for Atmospheric
Research and 3 Australian National University
We can achieve a major step forward in geoscience
capability, knowledge, and usage throughout the
world for the benefit of humanity by accelerating
the adoption of modern and visionary practices
for managing and sharing data and information. 
Education and Public Outreach The goal of
eGY Education and Public Outreach is to create an
education portal that connects teachers, in a
well-defined way, to the virtual observatories
and modeling programs. The programming developed
would allow teachers to use the virtual
observatories and their data in an educational
context, with supporting materials and
activities. In addition, and perhaps as
important, the portal would support virtual
educational communities, both synchronously and
asynchronously. There would be virtual seminars,
not only on science content, but on the
educational technology and assessment, for
example. We would provide multimedia assets for
teachers, including scientific talks,
computer-based animations and interactives.
e-Science for Geoscience The Electronic
Geophysical1 Year, 2007-2008 develops a 21st
Century e-Science approach to issues of data
stewardshipmaking past, present, and future
geoscientific data openly and readily available.
eGY sets out to provide a cooperative environment
and an international mandate to help
revolutionize geophysical data availability and
access worldwide using the capabilities offered
by modern digital communications and information
management technologies.
Declaration for a Geoscience Information
Commons Knowledge is the common wealth of
humanity 1 Preamble The Electronic Geophysical
Year (eGY) joins with the International Council
for Science, the World Summit on the Information
Society, and many other bodies in recognizing
that knowledge is the common wealth of humanity.
We have a shared responsibility to create and
implement strategies to realize the full
potential of digital information for present and
future generations. In the 21st century and
beyond, access to digital information and new
technologies for information integration and
knowledge discovery will influence the free and
productive development of societies around the
world. Providing ready and open access to the
vast and growing collections of
cross-disciplinary digital information is the key
to understanding and responding to complex Earth
system phenomena that influence human survival.
In the geosciences, as elsewhere, the issues of
concern are as follows. Article 1 Data
access Earth system data and information should
be made available electronically with
interoperable approaches that facilitate open
access. Article 2 Data release Owners,
custodians, and creators of Earth system data
should work together to share their digital
information with the world community, though in a
manner that respects intellectual property
rights and security constraints. Article 3 Data
description Providers and users of Earth system
data and information should share descriptions
of structure, content, and contexts to
facilitate interoperability and the discovery of
relationships within and between information
resources. Article 4 Data persistence Data and
information about the Earth system should be
preserved and sustained in forms that are both
software and hardware independent so as to be
openly accessible today and in the
future. Article 5 Data rescue Effort should be
made to identify and rescue critical Earth system
data and ensure persistent access to them.
Article 6 Common standards and
cooperation Standards for interoperability
should be identified, created, and implemented
through international collaboration. Article 7
Capability building Communities with advanced
information technology and communications
capabilities should contribute to developing
such capabilities elsewhere to reduce the digital
divide. Article 8 Education and public
outreach Students, scientists, decision-makers,
and the public should be informed about and be
enabled to contribute to our understanding and
management of Earth system phenomena that
impact human survival. 1 Adama Samassekou,
Convener of the UN World Summit on the
Information Society.
A coordinated international effort spanning all
geoscience disciplines will help us maximize the
value to society of e-Science developments and to
share the benefits equally between all nations.
A Sequel to IGY eGY coincides with the
50-year anniversary of the highly successful
International Geophysical Year, 1957-1958 (IGY).
By inspiring and coordinating geoscientific
programs worldwide and establishing a global
network of observatories and World Data Centers,
IGY provided open access by the world community
to vastly better and more comprehensive
information about the Earth and geospace. eGY
sets out to accomplish in 21st-Century terms what
the IGY achieved 50 years ago.
The Electronic Geophysical Year Partners

• The GeoUnions - a new consortium comprising
• IUGGInternational Union of Geodesy and
  Geophysics
• IUGSInternational Union of Geological
  Sciences
• IUSSInternational Union of Soil Sciences
• IGUInternational Geographical Union
• ISPRSInternational Society for
  Photogrammetry and
• Remote Sensing
• ICSU and its bodies
• International Association of Geomagnetism and
  Aeronomy (IAGA)
• CODATA and CODATA National Committees
• The World Data Centers and ICSUs WDC Panel
• International science associations and
  organizations IAHS,
• SCOSTEP, AOGS, IAG, IUSS, IAVCEI, IASPEI
• National Academies of Science and national
  geoscience committees
• National science agencies NSF, NASA, USGS,
  NOAA, BGS
• Geoscience Societies AGU, SEG, AOGS
• Climate and Weather of the Sun-Earth System
  (CAWSES)
• Scientific Committee On Solar-Terrestrial
  Physics (SCOSTEP)

The Electronic Geophysical Year Calendar
February 2007 19-20 IHY Launch, United Nations
Basin Science Program Meeting -- Vienna,
Austria March 2007 13-14 eGY General
Meeting--Boulder, CO, USA
(www.egy.org) April 2007 15-20 EGU General
Assembly--Vienna, Austria
(meetings.copernicus.org/egu2007/) May
2007 14-18 IHY Conference 2007 Heliophysics
The Sun, the Heliosphere and the Earth Bad
Honnef, Germany (ihy2007.org) 22-25 AGU Joint
Assembly-- Acapulco, Mexico (www.agu.org) June
2007 19-22 Virtual Observatories Conference,
Denver, CO (www.egy.org/Voconference.html) July
2007 2-13 IUGG XXIV General Assembly Earth,
Our Changing Planet-- Perugia, Italy
(www.iugg2007perugia.it) 7 eGY Launch, IUGG
General Assembly -- Perugia, Italy
(www.egy.org)
Further Information Visit http//www.egy.org
IHY Inauguration Ceremony February 19, 2007