Tennessee Valley Authority

Since 1991, Fugro EarthData has partnered with the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the nation’s largest public power company, to provide mapping for such things as site selection, right-of-way alignments, and collaborative efforts with the state of Tennessee. Under TVA contract, the 2004 Paradise-Wilson transmission line project in support of the USGS National Digital Orthophoto Program earned Fugro EarthData the USGS innovation award. Fugro EarthData generated raster scans from color-infrared photography of the 1,000-sq-mi area, then used existing control, aerotriangulation, and DEMs in its new "second-overage" methodology to develop the orthophotography. Using existing data reduced production times significantly, saving TVA the time and costs associated with traditional methodologies. Fugro EarthData worked with TVA technical staff to attribute and label the resultant GIS data.