Geothermal Information System as Support for Exploration of Geothermal Resources in Colombia

Abstract

The Colombian Geological Survey – SGC (for its initials in Spanish) is the governmental institution in charge of the scientific research on Earth sciences, which includes the exploration of geothermal resources, among others. In Addition the SGC is responsible for managing the information of the subsoil, including the information produced by the oil industry and several documentary resources. The large amount of geological, geophysical, geochemical and other geo-referenced data, obtained in activities of geothermal exploration and exploitation, demands the implementation of systems to store, organize, search, visualize and integrate data and information, in order to make it available for modeling and for a sustainable management of the resources. This work presents a proposal of a geothermal information system structured and developed to meet the needs of institutional and external users, taking into account the developments of other countries, as a reference. The Geothermal Information System (GIST°) was built following the Unified Modeling Language - UML methodology. For conceptualizing and modeling this system, the phases of compilation and review of information, listing requirements and generating the logical model, were carried out. The information review was based on an extensive literature compilation of documented related experiences in countries at global and regional scale. For listing requirements phase, the survey methodology was applied to a target group which consisted of geologists, geochemists and geophysicist, involved in geothermal exploration and other institutional projects. Once the information was characterized, discussion workshops were held, with the participation of geoscientists who produce and use the information to be loaded in the information system. The structure of the logical model of the Geothermal Information System was finally proposed by means of entity-relationship diagrams to represent the entities and their related attributes.