2023 - 2025 USGS Lidar DEM: Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands

Products: These are the raster digital elevation model (DEM) data for the USGS PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_D24 project.

Geographic Extent:

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_1 (Work Unit 300754) - Approximately 53.7 square miles covering Vieques Island.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_2 (Work Unit 300755) - Approximately 22.2 square miles covering Isla de Mona.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_3 (Work Unit 300756) - Approximately 13.8 square miles covering Culebra Island.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_4 (Work Unit 300945) - Approximately 1783.8 square miles covering the west side of the Puerto Rico mainland.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_5 (Work Unit 301144) - Approximately 137.7 square miles covering the U.S. Virgin Islands (St. Thomas, St. John, St. Croix).

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_6 (Work Unit 301206) - Approximately 1602 square miles covering the east side of the Puerto Rico mainland.

Dataset Description: This Puerto Rico project called for the planning, acquisition, processing, and derivative products of lidar data to be collected at an aggregate nominal pulse spacing (ANPS) of 0.35 meters (8ppsm). Project specifications are based on the U.S. Geological Survey National Geospatial Program Base Lidar Specification 2024 Rev A. The data were delivered as tiled bare earth DEM files, formatted to individual 1000 m x 1000 m tiles. Swath separation images and maximum height surface rasters are included as well in the final deliverables.

Ground Conditions: Lidar was collected in Winter of 2023 to Spring of 2025, under cloud, fog, and snow free conditions, with no unusual flooding or inundation.

This metadata record supports the data entry in the NOAA Digital Coast Data Access Viewer (DAV). For this data set, the DAV is leveraging the GeoTIFF files hosted by USGS on Amazon Web Services.

This lidar data will support the United States Geological Survey (USGS) initiatives.

USGS Contract No. 140G0221D0010 CONTRACTOR: Fugro Geospatial, Inc. SUBCONTRACTOR: Terrasurv, Inc. Ground control and checkpoints collected by Terrasurv, Inc. All processing was completed by the prime contractor.

DEM Raster File Type = GeoTIFF

Bit Depth/Pixel Type = 32-bit float

Raster Cell Size = .5 meter

Interpolation or Resampling Technique = Triangulated Irregular Network (TIN)

Network Required Vertical Accuracy = 10 cm NVA

Any conclusions drawn from the analysis of this information are not the responsibility of NOAA, the Office for Coastal Management or its partners.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_1 (Work Unit 300754) - Approximately 53.7 square miles covering Vieques Island.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_2 (Work Unit 300755) - Approximately 22.2 square miles covering Isla de Mona

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_3 (Work Unit 300756) - Approximately 13.8 square miles covering Culebra Island.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_4 (Work Unit 300945) - Approximately 1783.8 square miles covering the west side of the Puerto Rico mainland.

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_5 (Work Unit 301144) - Approximately 137.7 square miles covering the U.S. Virgin Islands (St. Thomas, St. John, St. Croix).

PR_PuertoRicoUSVI_6 (Work Unit 301206) - Approximately 1602 square miles covering the east side of the Puerto Rico mainland.

To the extent possible under law, the U.S. Government has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this dataset.

Data is available online for bulk and custom downloads.

None

Users should be aware that temporal changes may have occurred since this data set was collected and some parts of this data may no longer represent actual surface conditions. Users should not use this data for critical applications without a full awareness of its limitations.

This data set was produced to meet ASPRS Positional Accuracy Standards for Digital Geospatial Data, Edition 2 (2023) for a 18.9 cm RMSEh horizontal positional accuracy class.

This data set was tested to meet ASPRS Positional Accuracy Standards for Digital Geospatial Data, Edition 2 (2023) for a 10 cm RMSEV Vertical Accuracy Class.

USGS Determined DEM Vertical Accuracy

Non-Vegetated Vertical Accuracy (NVA) = 4.41 cm RMSE

Vegetated Vertical Accuracy (VVA) = 37.5 cm at the 95th Percentile

Refer to the USGS Project Report. A link to this report is provided in the URL section of this metadata record.

A complete iteration of processing (GPS/IMU Processing, Raw Lidar Data Processing, and Verification of Coverage and Data Quality) was performed to ensure that the acquired data was complete, uncorrupted, and that the entire project area had been covered without gaps between flight lines. No void areas or missing data exist. The raw point cloud is of good quality and data passes Vertical Accuracy requirements.

A visual qualitative assessment was performed to ensure data completeness. No void areas or missing data exist. The point cloud is of good quality and data passes Vertical Accuracy requirements. A visual qualitative assessment was performed to ensure data completeness. No void areas or missing data exist.

The DEM raster files cover the entire project delivery boundary. The pixels that fall outside the project delivery boundary are set to Void with a unique “NODATA” value. The value is identified in the file headers. There are no void pixels inside the project boundary. A visual qualitative assessment was performed to ensure data completeness. No void areas or missing data exist. The bare earth surface is of good quality and passes Vertical Accuracy requirements.

Compliance with the accuracy standard was ensured by the collection of ground control and the establishment of GPS base stations in the project area. The following checks were performed: 1) The lidar data accuracy was validated by performing a full boresight adjustment and then checking it against the ground control prior to generating a digital terrain model (DTM) or other products. 2) Lidar elevation data was validated through an inspection of edge matching and visual inspection for quality (artifact removal). The following software was used for the validation: 1) RiProcess 1.8.3, RiWorld 5.0.2, RiAnalyze 6.2, RiServer 1.99.5; and 2) Fugro proprietary software.

The NOAA Office for Coastal Management (OCM) ingested references to the USGS GeoTIFF files that are hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS), into the Digital Coast Data Access Viewer (DAV). The DAV accesses the raster data as it resides on AWS.