The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been overseeing a multimillion-dollar data exchange grant program that, since 2002, provided almost $65 million to states, tribes and territories.
According to the agency, the grant program resulted in the development of 32 operational exchange network nodes for the Environmental Information Exchange Network. The nodes are environmental data portals maintained individually by partners participating in the project, with each node serving as a point of interaction among project participants.
Each node also represents a collection of specific technical and policy components used to provide and receive information via the network, which relies on the Internet and standardized data formats. Participants control and manage their own data, while making them available to partners via requests over a secure Internet connection.
The project uses data exchange templates and schemas, data standards, and data trading partner agreements to ensure data integrity by defining data needs and establishing standards for transmission.
The Exchange Network became operational in 2003 after performing its first automated data exchange. Now the network consists of more than 30 state partners.
The network's origins trace back to 1998, when state environmental agencies, in collaboration with EPA, formed the Information Management Work Group (IMWG) to address issues such as data integrity and efficient information exchange among partners.
The network effectively is a joint venture among EPA and state environmental agencies, and it's governed by the Network Steering Board with advisory support from several EPA/state co-sponsored groups, including IMWG, the Environmental Data Standards Council and the EPA Quality Information Council's Exchange Network Subcommittee.
Project participants advocate that network partners build nodes that can request (i.e., "consume") data from the network as well as "publish" data to the network in response to requests from other network nodes.
Some states, however, have chosen to begin with a simpler version, called a node client, that can request data from other nodes but not actively "listen" and respond on its own to requests for data from other nodes or clients on the network.
States partners and EPA developed several node and client configurations. So far, every state and more than 40 tribes have participated in the network's development. More information on the grant program is available on the Web at www.epa.gov/neengprg/grants/index.html.
No comments:
Post a Comment