Researchers look through microscopes at damage to fish by rapid decompression.

PNNL's Earth Systems Science Division provides leadership and solutions that advance earth system opportunities for energy system transitions and national security.

Our multi-disciplinary division is connected by a shared commitment to deliver through innovation and collaboration. We solve complex problems in the dynamic Earth system. Our staff steward a breadth of capabilities, including earth/energy systems, infrastructure analysis, and engineering; decision science and analysis; and earth, environmental, and atmospheric science.

Earth Systems Science Projects and Tools

Initiative

GODEEEP

Energy grid equity

GODEEEP is an internal PNNL Agile investment that addresses U.S. priorities related to clean energy and environmental and energy equity.

(Composite image: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

Center for the Remediation of Complex Sites

RemPlex Hero Image

Image: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

INSITE: Revolutionizing How the Subsurface is Interrogated and Understood

CSESHero_8

INSITE is a revolutionary subsurface monitoring and assessment platform centered on highly sophisticated autonomous and continuous electrical sensing.

Jeff London | Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

E4D

Computer graphic of E4D, showing the colorful three-dimensional image of what's underground.

E4D uses electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) measurements to reconstruct time-lapse images of the electrical conductivity of the soil. 

SOCRATES

Illustration showing layers of the subsurface

SOCRATES web-based visualization tools target a wide variety of subsurface applications.

(Illustration by Delphine Appriou | Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

Geologic Carbon Storage

X-ray diffractometer

The X-ray diffractometer (XRD) is capable of examining materials under extreme conditions.

Andrea Starr | Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

State of Stress Analysis Tool

3d image of sediment layers with screenshot images of the state of analysis tool

Conceptual and visual outputs from the State of Stress Analysis Tool (SOSAT) showing geomechanical risk estimation at a geological carbon storage site. SOSAT enables users to evaluate and predict potential geomechanical risks, ensuring safe and effective CO2 sequestration by analyzing the state of stress within the geological formations. 

(Illustration by Nathan Johnson | Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

UNSAT-H

An illustration showing how water flows into the layers of the subsurface.
Program

Water Quality

HeroWaterQuality

HydroWIRES

Hydrowiresphoto

The Hydropower and Water Innovation for a Resilient Electricity System (HydroWIRES) initiative is designed to clarify hydropower's role in the modern grid infrastructure and to explore oppoortunities for optimizing grid operations.

Donald Jorgensen/PNNL

EARTH - Environmental Sciences and Risk Analyses Tools

Photo of Earth from NASA satellite

This image from NASA depicts a full view of the Earth, taken by the Geostationary Operational Environment Satellite (GOES-8). The red and green charnels represent visible data, while the blue channel represents inverted 11 micron infrared data. 

(Image courtesy of National Aeronautics and Space Administration [NASA])

STOMP

Stomp logo

Distributed Hydrology Soil Vegetation Model

lake surrounded with mountain covered in snow

Remediation Performance Assessment

3D - remediation

Multi-Species Reactive Transport Simulation Software for Groundwater Systems

Mass Flow - RT3D

Aquifer Injection Modeling Toolbox

ERT

The Hanford Site's 300 Area—being monitored by PNNL's electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) imaging software—is about a quarter-mile west of the Columbia River.

TRAC: Tracking Restoration And Closure

TRAC: Tracking Restoration and Closure title graphic

The Tracking Restoration And Closure (TRAC) tool enables information sharing about and provides transparency into environmental remediation progress at Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management (DOE-EM) sites nationwide.

Visual Sample Plan

VSP

Project Schedule Visualizer

Conceptual image of person interacting with project schedule visualization on a monitor

The user-friendly P6 Schedule Visualizer tool, developed by researchers at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, is available for non-exclusive license in all fields at costs that are highly competitive with other commercially available tools with similar functionality.

Composite image by Cortland Johnson | Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Risk Analysis and Management

Gannt Charts