Idaho National Laboratory Seismic Monitoring Program

Session: Regional Earthquake Centers: Highlights and Challenges [Poster]
Type: Poster
Date: 4/28/2020
Time: 08:00 AM
Room: Ballroom
Description: 

The Idaho National Laboratory (INL) Seismic Monitoring Program began as a single station in 1971. The network has grown to include 36 seismic stations, 19 strong-motion accelerometers (SMAs) and 17 Global Positioning Stations (GPS). INL resides on the Eastern Snake River Plain (ESRP), located in southeast Idaho. INL has a history operating nuclear test reactors and is currently designated as the Reactor Innovation Center. During the last five decades, the INL seismic network has undergone several periods of major upgrades to support evolving nuclear-related missions at INL. The first network upgrade included installation of several short period analog seismic stations and accelerometers before and in response to the 1983 moment magnitude 6.9 Borah Peak, Idaho earthquake. By 1987 10 seismic stations and 19 SMAs were in operation both within and around the INL site boundaries. The second upgrade included conversion from paper to digital seismograms using a CUSP (Caltech-USGS Seismic Processing) system in the early 1990’s along with installation of 19 more seismic stations. This was followed by a transition from CUSP to EARTHWORM and replacement of analog station instrumentation to digital field dataloggers in the early 2000’s. The next major upgrade, between 2003 to 2009, was the installation of 15 permanent GPS receivers in and around the ESRP supplemented with several campaign GPS surveys. The final upgrade from 2010 to 2019 included installation of several new seismic stations, acquisition of a Transportable Array station, upgrades from short-period to broadband seismometers and replacement to newer accelerometers. Along with upgrades to seismic instrumentation, network telemetry instrumentation also advanced. Each of these periods of growth improved detection sensitivity and waveform recording to allow better characterization of seismicity and tectonics in and around the ESRP. This presentation will discuss the evolution of the INL seismic network in further detail and will also discuss the challenges encountered and what was done to overcome them.

Presenting Author: Blaine Bockholt

Authors