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Heat flow maps and supporting data for the Great Basin, USA

Metadata Updated: November 19, 2025

Geothermal well data from Southern Methodist University (SMU, 2021) and the U.S. Geological Survey (Sass et al., 2005) were used to create maps of estimated background conductive heat flow across the greater Great Basin region of the western US. The heat flow maps in this data release were created using a process that sought to remove hydrothermal convective influence from predictions of background conductive heat flow. Heat flow maps were constructed using a custom-developed iterative process using weighted regression, where convectively influenced outliers were de-emphasized by assigning lower weights to measurements that are very different from the estimated local trend (e.g., local convective influence). The weighted regression algorithm is 2D LOESS (locally estimated scatterplot smoothing; Cleveland et al., 1992), which was used for local linear regression, and smoothness was controlled by varying the number of nearby points used for each local interpolation. Three maps are included in this data release, allowing comparison of the influence of measurement confidence: all wells are equal-weight, and two different published categorizations of measurement quality were used to de-emphasize low-quality measurements. Each map is an estimate of background conductive heat flow as a function of assumed data quality, and a point coverage is also provided for all wells in the compiled dataset. The point coverage includes an important new attribute for geothermal wells: the residual, which can be interpreted as the well’s departure from estimated background heat flow conditions, and the value of residual may be useful in identifying hydrothermal or groundwater influence on conductive heat flow. References Cleveland, W. S., Grosse, E., Shyu, W. M, 1992, Local regression models. Chapter 8 of Statistical Models in S eds J.M. Chambers and T.J. Hastie, Wadsworth & Brooks/Cole. Sass, J. H., S.S. Priest, A.H. Lachenbruch, S.P. Galanis, Jr., T.H. Moses, Jr., J.P. Kennelly, Jr., R.J. Munroe, E.P. Smith, F.V. Grubb, R.H. Husk, Jr., and C.W. Mase, 2005, Summary of supporting data for USGS regional heat flow studies of the Great Basin, 1970-1990, USGS Open file Report, 2005-1207. SMU Regional Heat Flow Database, retrieved from http://geothermal.smu.edu on March 29, 2021.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date September 12, 2025
Metadata Updated Date November 19, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from DOI USGS DCAT-US

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date September 12, 2025
Metadata Updated Date November 19, 2025
Publisher U.S. Geological Survey
Maintainer
Identifier http://datainventory.doi.gov/id/dataset/usgs-6297d2fad34ec53d276c5b28
Data Last Modified 2022-07-20T00:00:00Z
Category geospatial
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 010:12
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://ddi.doi.gov/usgs-data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id d0c7879b-1dc1-4e36-b14a-d97ebcbca477
Harvest Source Id 2b80d118-ab3a-48ba-bd93-996bbacefac2
Harvest Source Title DOI USGS DCAT-US
Metadata Type geospatial
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash c7b38a9d11ed666dd37eed00cac00f052a87ea2775fb330219a21231913617d1
Source Schema Version 1.1

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