Geothermal potential of orphan oil and gas wells
Rand Gardner, Justin E. Birdwell, Matthew D. Merrill, Ashton M. Wiens, Karl Haase, Nicholas J. Gianoutsos, Uei I. Lei, Patrick Sullivan
2025, Conference Paper, Using the Earth to save the Earth
The United States is estimated to have hundreds of thousands of orphan oil and gas wells. Orphan wells are abandoned wells that are both unremediated and have no responsible operator. While traditionally considered environmental and economic liabilities, orphan oil and gas wells may offer new opportunities in sustainable geothermal energy...
Exploring Martian geothermal and liquid water potential with basin modeling
Rand Gardner, Justin E. Birdwell, Katherine L. French, Chris Okubo, Janet K. Pitman, Stanley T. Paxton, Jason A. Flaum
2025, Conference Paper, Using the Earth to save the Earth
Assessing the potential for geothermal energy and liquid water presence in the Martian subsurface is crucial for future exploration and habitability studies. In this work, we employed comprehensive finite element model simulations adapted specifically for Martian conditions to estimate subsurface temperatures and the potential for liquid water at depth within Martian...
Potential for co-production of lithium and geothermal resources in the Gulf Coast
Rand Gardner, Justin E. Birdwell
2025, Conference Paper, Using the Earth to save the Earth
Lithium brine extractions and geothermal resource developments often are not economically viable as standalone projects, but they May become cost effective when the potential for both resources exist within the same reservoir. Subsurface datasets were analyzed to identify areas in the U.S. Gulf Coast region with potential for lithium brine...
Leveraging an observed-data likelihood improves the use of machine learning labels in a Bayesian hierarchical model for bioacoustic data
Jacob Oram, Katharine M. Banner, Christian Stratton, Andrew Hoegh, Kathryn Irvine
2025, Annals of Applied Statistics (19) 2957-2980
Classification of massive datasets by machine learning (ML) algorithms is promising for many scientific domains, especially wildlife monitoring programs that rely on passive acoustic surveys for detecting species. However, treating ML-predicted class labels (e.g., species identity) as truth biases inferences of focal parameters within common modeling frameworks. One solution is...
Range-wide population trend analysis for greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus)—Updated 1960–2024
Brian G. Prochazka, Peter S. Coates, Cameron L. Aldridge, Michael S. O’Donnell, David R. Edmunds, Adrian P. Monroe, Steve E. Hanser, Lief A. Wiechman, Michael P. Chenaille
2025, Data Report 1217
Greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus; hereafter sage-grouse) are at the center of State and national land-use policies largely because of their unique life-history traits as an ecological indicator for the health of sagebrush ecosystems. This updated population trend analysis provides State and Federal land and wildlife managers with the best available...
The Hawaiian Volcanoes Supersite: Open data for the benefit of science and society
Michael Poland, Stefano Salvi, Falk Amelung, Marco Bagnardi, Tyler Grant Paladino, Ingrid A. Johanson, Megan McLay
2025, Bulletin of Volcanology (87)
The Hawaiian Volcanoes Supersite was established in 2008 with the goal of making large amounts of volcano monitoring data, especially satellite measurements, freely available at a site of international interest, scientific importance, and impactful natural hazards. The location was chosen because of the long history of volcanological research and innovation...
Disentangling geomorphic equifinality in sediment and hydrologic connectivity through the analyses of landscape drivers of hysteresis
Jong Cho, J. William Lund, Grady Ball, Jeb E. Brown, Allen C. Gellis, Laura N. Gurley, Scott Douglas Hamshaw, Jeffrey Stephen Kwang, Andrew Roy Laws, Gregory E. Noe, Gretchen P. Oelsner, Francis Parchaso, Cara L. Peterman-Phipps, Katherine Skalak, Nicholas Alan Sutfin
2025, Earth Surface Processes and Landforms (50)
Sources, transport mechanisms and pathways of fine sediment in river systems are dependent on a multitude of climatic, geomorphic and anthropogenic factors, resulting in geomorphic equifinality, in which it is difficult to parse how different landscape processes affect sediment transport across different spatiotemporal scales. The objectives of this study are...
Summer snow determines the depth to ice-cemented ground under dry permafrost in Antarctica
C. P. McKay, M. Marinova, Kaj E. Williams, M. Mellon
2025, Antarctic Science
Dry permafrost underlain by ice-cemented permafrost has been reported in several locations in Antarctica. Initially thought to be relic ice, it is now understood that this subsurface ice is in equilibrium with the surface conditions, although it is not in equilibrium with the atmosphere. We use year-round data from University...
Comparisons of shoreline positions from satellite-derived and traditional field- and remote-sensing techniques
Andrea C. O'Neill, Sharon F. Batiste, Daniel D. Buscombe, Joseph Burgess, Kara S. Doran, Ann E. Gibbs, Rachel E. Henderson, Julia L. Heslin, Catherine N. Janda, Mark A. Lundine, Joseph F. Terrano, Jonathan A. Warrick, Kathryn M. Weber
2025, Open-File Report 2025-1054
Satellite-derived shorelines (SDS) have the potential to help researchers answer critical coastal science questions and support work to predict coastal change by filling in the spatial and temporal gaps present in current field-based and remote-sensing data collection methods. The U.S. Geological Survey conducted comparison analyses of traditionally sourced shorelines and...
The acoustic-Doppler current profiler (ADCP): A comprehensive tool for river-reach hydromorphodynamics
Gábor Fleit, Marian Muste, Sándor Baranya, Dongsu Kim, Amanda Whaling, Tate McAlpin, Hojun You
2025, Advances in Water Resources (206)
This paper introduces the use of acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP) measurements as input for the Acoustic Mapping Velocimetry (AMV) method, a technique for characterizing the dynamics of riverine bedforms. The performance of this new approach, ADCP-AMV, is compared with input from a multibeam echosounder through a...
Trophic assessment of potential competition between invasive cichlids and sport fish in Puerto Rico reservoirs
J. Wesley Neal, Jacob A. Moreland, Corey Garland Dunn, Peter J. Allen
2025, North American Journal of Fisheries Management
Objective Several species of New World cichlids have recently invaded reservoirs in Puerto Rico, potentially jeopardizing established recreationally important, albeit nonnative, sport fish populations. Interactions between invasive species and important sport fish must be understood so that they can be mitigated when feasible. This study compared monthly prey consumption between three...
Temporal changes in nutrient concentrations in the Lower Grand River and selected drainage basins, Missouri and Iowa, during the Mississippi River Basin Healthy Watersheds Initiative (2010–23)
Brock J.W. Kamrath, Courtney N. Lauderback, Jennifer C. Murphy
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5099
This report describes a cooperative study by the U.S. Geological Survey and Missouri Department of Natural Resources that evaluated temporal changes in total nitrogen (TN) and total phosphorus (TP) concentrations in the Lower Grand River hydrologic unit. The study focused on trends since 2010, when the basin was designated as...
An evaluation of the effects of different deicing salt application rates on three watersheds in Essex County, New York
Kristina Gutchess, Natasha Scavotto, Amanda Dondero, Joshua Woda, Neil Terry, Kirk Smith, John Williams
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5062
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the New York State Department of Transportation, evaluated the effects of different deicing salt application rates on surface water, groundwater, and highway runoff quality near State highways in northern New York. Three reaches of State highways were tested with different deicing treatments between...
Evaluating the central–marginal hypothesis: Introgression and genetic variation at the trailing edge of Quercus bicolor
Jesse B. Parker, Sean Hoban, Laura Thompson, Scott E. Schlarbaum
2025, Molecular Ecology (34)
The central–marginal hypothesis (CMH) predicts reduced genetic diversity and increased differentiation in range-edge populations due to ecological marginality and limited gene flow. Deviations from this pattern, however, can result from historical demographic processes, variation in reproductive strategies or interspecific hybridization. The genus Quercus, known for hybridization and long-distance pollination, offers an...
Spatial occupancy patterns of the endangered northern long‐eared bat in New England
Jesse L De La Cruz, Sabrina M. Deeley, Elizabeth Ann Hunter, W. Mark Ford
2025, Diversity and Distributions (31)
AimWhite-nose syndrome has caused severe declines in eastern North American cave bats, leading to the federal listing of the northern long-eared bat (Myotis septentrionalis) as endangered in the United States and Canada. This has heightened the importance of long-term monitoring to inform species status assessments. We employed a combination of...
Estimating flood discharges at selected annual exceedance probabilities for unregulated, rural streams in Vermont, 2023
Scott A. Olson
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5088
This report provides estimates of flood discharge at selected annual exceedance probabilities (AEPs) for streamgages in and adjacent to Vermont and equations for estimating flood discharges at AEPs of 50-, 20-, 10-, 4-, 2-, 1-, 0.5-, and 0.2-percent (recurrence intervals of 2-, 5-, 10-, 25-, 50-, 100-, and 500-years, respectively)...
A monitoring framework to assess forest bird population response to landscape scale mosquito suppression using the Incompatible Insect Technique
Seth Judge, Christopher C Warren, Amanda K Navine, Richard J. Camp, Lisa H. Crampton, Hanna L Mounce, John Vetter, Lauren K. Smith, Patrick J. Hart, Mona Renee Bellinger, Katherine Maria McClure
2025, Hawaii Cooperative Studies Unit Technical Report HCSU-119
The Birds, Not Mosquitoes Monitoring and Support Science Working Group detailed methods for monitoring the population response of Hawaiian forest birds during implementation of the Incompatible Insect Technique (IIT) on the islands of Maui and Kauaʻi. The group prioritized methods for measuring the influence of mosquito suppression on populations within...
Groundwater structures fish growth and production across a riverscape
Jeffrey R. Baldock, Robert Al-Chokhachy, Annika W. Walters
2025, Freshwater Biology (70)
Landscapes are composed of habitat patches and conditions that vary across space and time. While habitat variability and complexity can support important ecological processes and ecosystem services, the dynamic nature of habitats can also constrain organismal growth and production as optimal conditions are fleeting. In riverine ecosystems, groundwater discharge...
When do single-species occupancy models outperform multispecies models?
Gavin G. Cotterill, Douglas A. Keinath, Tabitha A. Graves
2025, Ecology and Evolution (15)
Occupancy models have become increasingly popular for species monitoring and assessment, in part, because detection/non-detection data are readily obtained using a variety of methods. Multispecies occupancy models (MSOMs) can yield more accurate parameter estimates than single-species models (SSOMs) with less data through their hierarchical structure, making MSOMs an attractive option...
Twenty years (2000-2020) of butterfly monitoring data across the contiguous United States
Erica H Henry, Collin B. Edwards, Vaughn Shirey, Jeffrey S. Pippen, Dave Waetjen, Matthew L. Forister, Elise A. Larsen, Cheryl B. Schultz, James Michielini, Nathan Brockman, Kevin J. Burls, Ryan G. Drum, Martha Gatch, Jeffrey Glassberg, Nancy Hamlett, Shiran V. Hershcovich, Catherine Le, Steve McGaffin, Jen Meilinger, Lisa Richter, Regina Rochefort, Charles Schelz, Arthur M. Shapiro, Katheryn Sullivan, Douglas J. Taron, Wayne E. Thogmartin, Anna Walker, Anita Westphal, Jerome Wiedmann, Irmgard U. Wilcockson, Jennifer Zaspel, Leslie Ries
2025, Scientific Data (12)
We present the most comprehensive, integrated, butterfly monitoring dataset ever assembled for the United States. It contains over 1.2 million count records, from 65,000 surveys, representing over 12.6 million individual butterflies. To compile this dataset, we integrated data and harmonized taxonomy across 19 butterfly monitoring programs in...
The rise of U.S. photovoltaics: An exploration of land use density trends in large-scale solar facility attributes, 2012-2021
K. Sydny Fujita, Ben Hoen, Dana Robson, Joesph Rand, Zachary H. Ancona, James Diffendorfer, Louisa Kramer, Christopher Garrity, Jianyu Gu, Jordan Macknick
2025, International Journal of Photoenergy (2025)
An energy transition is underway in the United States; renewable energy generation is now on par with coal and nuclear generation. The number of large-scale solar photovoltaic facilities increased approximately tenfold between 2012 and 2021, with an associated 25-fold increase in cumulative installed capacity. With ambitious decarbonization and renewable energy...
Spatio-temporal evolution of distributed volcanic fields, case studies—Sierra Chichinautzin and Michoacán-Guanajuato, México
Carmen Jaimes-Viera, Amiel Nieto-Torres, Ana Lillian Martin Del Pozzo, Aurelie Germa, Chuck Connor, Michael H. Ort, Paul Layer, Jeff Benowitz
2025, Professional Paper 1890-I
An analysis of 1,375 volcanoes in the Michoacán-Guanajuato (1,148 volcanoes in a 26,200 square-kilometer area) and Sierra Chichinautzin (227 volcanoes in a 3,500 square-kilometer area) volcanic fields in central Mexico identified patterns in the spatial and temporal distribution of past eruptions. A cluster agglomerative hierarchical method and kernel analysis confirmed...
Rare earth elements on the Moon
Laszlo P. Keszthelyi, Joshua A. Coyan, Lori M. Pigue, Kristen A. Bennett, Travis S.J. Gabriel
2025, Fact Sheet 2025-3049
Rare earth elements (REEs) are a scarce but vital resource for our modern economies and lifestyles. Since the late 1990s, China has supplied the vast majority of the world’s refined REEs. Increasing global demand has broadened the search for REE deposits to unconventional places, including the Moon. Although most lunar...
The 1912 Ms 7.2 earthquake in the Denali region of central Alaska
Carl Tape, Marco Aquino-Lopez, Sean Bemis, Peter J. Haeussler, Jessalyn Ginnaty
2025, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America
The 2002 Mw 7.9 earthquake in central Alaska ruptured 340 km on three faults—Susitna Glacier thrust fault, Denali fault, Totschunda fault—crossing both the Richardson Highway and the Alaska Pipeline. Its occurrence prompted renewed interest in historical large earthquakes that possibly originated on the Denali fault. One of these earthquakes was a Ms 7.2...
Systematic approach to prioritize wells for effective groundwater monitoring and management in the Arkansas Headwaters Basin, Colorado, USA
Eleanor E. Fahrney, David C. Mays, Connor P. Newman
2025, Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies (62)
Study regionThe Arkansas Headwaters Basin, an intermountain basin in the Southern Rocky Mountains of North America.Study focusOur specific focus is choosing a set of wells to support a possible future regional groundwater-surface water model that would...
