SeismicRequirements2026.pdf

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), Albuquerque Seismological Laboratory (ASL) has a requirement to purchase earthquake and volcano monitoring systems, including integrated systems (containing both sensors and data acquisition units (DAUs)) and systems comprised of separate DAUs and sensors (either strong motion sensors or broadband sensors). This equipment will be used in the Advanced National Seismic System (ANSS), the Global Seismographic Network (GSN), and the USGS Volcano Program to serve the needs of earthquake and volcano monitoring, engineering, and research communities as well as national, state, and local governments, emergency response organizations, and the public.

The USGS operates the Global Seismographic Network (GSN) which has the world’s seismically quietest sites at long periods (200-1000s periods). The low noise recordings at these sites are required for determining the magnitude of the world’s largest earthquakes which the USGS reports on a 24/7 basis. To accomplish this mission of protecting lives and property by reducing the impact of geologic hazards, the USGS must install seismic instrumentation with the lowest self-noise possible (these sensors are called grade “A+” in the TestingSpecs2026 spreadsheet).

Nearly half of the GSN is made up of stations with boreholes which require borehole sensors.

Some of these boreholes are less than 6.5 inches diameter and require a sensor that is smaller than 6.1 inches in diameter. This sensor must also have an option for locking in place above the bottom of the borehole (known as a hole-lock).

The USGS portable aftershock systems and the USGS volcano program have a requirement for light weight, low power digitizers that can stream data using the SEEDlink protocol. The digitizer must be compatible with existing data acquisition software and allow for remote calibration of sensors.

The USGS volcano program and Volcano Disaster Assistance Program (VDAP) require light-weight sensors that have integrated broadband and strong motion sensors all in one easy to carry and easy to deploy package. These integrated systems are required because they must be hand carried to remote volcano locations. The USGS volcano program also desires a low power digitizer that is capable of streaming SNMP-formatted state of health information and the ability to connect a weather station without additional interface(s) or digitizer board(s) to minimize the form factor and power consumption.

A detailed listing of specifications and requirements are contained within this document and the accompanying spreadsheet titled “TestingSpecs2026”. These specifications describe a wide range of seismic monitoring instrumentation. For this solicitation the most important specification is “Maximum Incoherent Noise” of broadband sensors, specifically sensors with a “A+” ranking because the GSN requires sensors with the lowest self-noise possible. Vendors which can offer “A+” broadband sensors (in both posthole/borehole and vault-style package) along with the other specifications are strongly encouraged to submit a proposal for consideration. Vendors which do not have a “A+” grade broadband sensor to offer can still submit but their proposal will only be considered if there are no proposals with a “A+” grade broadband sensor that meet the overall requirements. If multiple proposals contain “A+” grade broadband sensors (which also meet the other performance, power and packaging requirements) then the proposal which meets or exceeds the most other requirements by offering a full range of seismic instrumentation will be selected.