Groundwater Markup Language

The emerging growth of OGC web services in the groundwater domain is likely to follow trends in other disciplines and result in a rich supply of groundwater data in heterogeneous and complex GML formats (Geography Markup Language), even within a single organization. The Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) has developed the Groundwater Markup Language (GWML) to overcome barriers to the use of the data in such environments. GWML is a common format for exchanging groundwater data. It extends two advanced GML standards, GeoSciML and Observations & Measurements, by adding entities such as hydrogeologic units (e.g. aquifers), properties (e.g. storativity), water wells, and water budget entities. Due to this firm grounding in OGC standards, GWML can be used with several OGC services such as WFS, WMS, WCS, and SOS, to enable exchange of a wide spectrum of groundwater data. GWML is an integral part of GSC's emerging groundwater information system ( www.gw-info.net ).

More information on GWML can be found at: http://ngwd-bdnes.cits.rncan.gc.ca/gwml.