The Defense Threat Reduction Agency is developing enhancements to the Hazard Prediction and Assessment Capability (HPAC) to enable it to provide dispersion and windfield calculations in urban areas. A key aspect to this program is the ability to acquire urban terrain data and to archive the data in a database for operational use. This work will support exterior and interior dispersion models as well as other DTRA models related to processes in urban areas. The database structure and content will be consistent with elements of the Joint Assessment of Catastrophic Events (JACE) building catalogue.

DTRA is engaged in an extensive project to accomplish these tasks. To acquire building data, DTRA is coordinating with the National Imagery and Mapping Agency to supply data derived from satellite imagery, with the Joint Precision Strike Demonstration to supply data derived from aircraft-based LIDAR data, and with other sources. To archive the data, DTRA and JACE developers are evaluating various database systems, and the state of development of this archival will be presented at the conference. The goal of the archive project is to assimilate all available building data, both interior and exterior, in a geo-referenced, consistent set, enabling the various models requiring the data to need only a single interface procedure to obtain the data relevant to a particular application.