Community Vulnerability Assessment
Oral
Nicole Kinsman, PhD
Alaska Geodetic Advisor
NOAA National Geodetic Survey
Coastal engineers rely on consistent heights for activities such as obstruction design or floodplain mapping. In 2022, the United States National Geodetic Survey will be replacing the North American Vertical Datum of 1988 (NAVD88) with the North American-Pacific Geopotential Datum of 2022 (NAPGD2022). The time-dependent nature of the modernized NSRS, combined with more systematic ties between NAPGD2022 and tidal datums, will significantly improve the quality of geospatial data in coastal environments by improving orthometric heights in areas experiencing relative sea level change. Furthermore, GPS-based access will provide an improved spatial framework for technologies like unmanned infrastructure monitoring and precision navigation.