Archuleta County CO Lineaments

This layer traces apparent topographic and air-photo lineaments in the area around Pagosa springs in Archuleta County, Colorado. It was made in order to identify possible fault and fracture systems that might be conduits for geothermal fluids.
Geothermal fluids commonly utilize fault and fractures in competent rocks as conduits for fluid flow. Geothermal exploration involves finding areas of high near-surface temperature gradients, along with a suitable plumbing system that can provide the necessary permeability. Geothermal power plants can sometimes be built where temperature and flow rates are high.

To do this, georeferenced topographic maps and aerial photographs were utilized in an existing GIS, using ESRI ArcMap 10.0 software. The USA_Topo_Maps and World_Imagery map layers were chosen from the GIS Server at server.arcgisonline.com, using a UTM Zone 13 NAD27 projection. This line shapefile was then constructed over that which appeared to be through-going structural lineaments in both the aerial photographs and topographic layers, taking care to avoid manmade features such as roads, fence lines, and right-of-ways. These lineaments may be displaced somewhat from their actual location, due to such factors as shadow effects with low sun angles in the aerial photographs.

Note: This shape file was constructed as an aid to geothermal exploration in preparation for a site visit for field checking. We make no claims as to the existence of the lineaments, their location, orientation, and nature.