VEMAP U.S. Soil Database with Modal Profile Representation

The dataset contains soil properties for the United States, aggregated to a 0.5-degree grid from a 10-km EPA soil database. It was developed by the Vegetation/Ecosystem Modeling and Analysis Project (VEMAP) for intercomparing biogeochemistry and vegetation distribution models. The data uniquely represents grid cells using up to four dominant soil profiles to preserve non-linear soil dynamics, alongside cell-averaged data.

Use Cases

• Intercomparing biogeochemistry model outputs using soil texture and organic matter columns.
• Analyzing vegetation distribution sensitivity to climate change using soil moisture and depth parameters.
• Studying soil water balance dynamics with non-linearly related texture and bulk density data.
• Aggregating subgrid soil variability for regional climate simulations using modal soil categories.

Strengths

• Soil properties are derived from a detailed 10-km gridded EPA database, ensuring a high-resolution foundation.
• Data uses a statistical cluster analysis to represent up to 4 modal soil profiles per grid cell, preserving non-linear soil processes.
• The dataset is part of an ongoing, multi-institutional international project (VEMAP), indicating sustained development and peer review.

Limitations

• Critical metadata conflicts exist: the last_updated date is reported as both 1990-12-31 and 2026-03-12 across platforms.
• Specific row counts, file sizes, and a complete column schema are not provided by any source.
• The dataset includes only soils from the USDA SCS NATSGO database, excluding the alternative FAO soil coverage.

Provenance

Source

ORNL_CLOUD; based on EPA soil database developed by Kern (1994, 1995) using USDA SCS NATSGO data.

Collection Method

Spatial aggregation via cluster analysis of 10-km elements to a 0.5-degree grid, identifying dominant modal soil profiles.

Time Range

null

Freshness

2026-03-12 20:25:03.804588

Geography

United States