ABSTRACT: The East Asia Geographic Map Series

Maurice J. Terman, Ellen P. Bell

During the last 15 years, the Circum-Pacific Map Project Northwest Quadrant Panel (NWQP) has created a map inventory of geoscience data at a scale of 1:10,000,000. Now, for East Asia, a second set of thematic maps is being initiated cooperatively by the Circum-Pacific Council for Energy and Mineral Resources and the Committee for Coordination of Joint Prospecting for Mineral Resources in Asian Offshore Areas (CCOP). These new maps will constitute the East Asia Map Project, and they will present geoscience parameters at a scale of 1:2,000,000 that can be used to evaluate the potential for undiscovered resources with the application of new deposit modeling methodologies. The following map series are being compiled or are under consideration: geography, geotectonics, geophys cs, mineral resources, energy resources, and hazards.

The U.S, Geological Survey (USGS) is compiling the East Asia Geographic Map Series. Shorelines, rivers, and international boundaries have been computer plotted by the National Mapping Division from the most detailed version of the World Data Bank II (WDB II). This publicly available bank was hand digitized from a 1:3,000,000-scale global map compiled from a variety of sources. The East Asia series is composed of eight overlapping sheets with Lambert Azimuthal Equal-Area Projection having a common point of origin at 120°E and 15°N; neatlines for each sheet are 39^Prime × 54.4^Prime. Titles reflect each map's coverage: Sheet 1, Japan/Korea/Northeast China; Sheet 2, Southeast China; Sheet 3, Southeast Asia; Sheet 4, Philippines; Sheet 5, Malaysia/West Indonesia; Sheet 6, E st Indonesia; Sheet 7, Papua New Guinea/Solomon Islands; and Sheet 8, Western Pacific Islands.

Contours have been scribed by the USGS's Office of International Geology. The principal source of bathymetry was compiled by 1976 at a scale of 1:3,200,000 by Scripps Institution of Oceanography; locally, more recent sources were used. Most topography is extracted from the 1:500,000-scale U.S. Tactical Pilotage Charts, or the 1:2,500,000-scale Soviet Karta Mira. Contour interval on seafloor and land is 500 m; both areas also have 200 m contours and selected additional contours where feasible. Sources are shown in marginalia and all data are compiled to fit WDB II.

City populations are taken from the 1987 Rand McNally New International Atlas, and arbitrary subdivisions are made where possible at 25,000; 100,000; 250,000; and 1,000,000. Place names are derived from a variety of sources, but spelling is governed by gazetteers of the U.S. Board of Geographic Names.

Currently all compilation of neatlines, shorelines, rivers, international boundaries, bathymetry, and topography is completed; place names are being added in 1990, and hypsometric tints will be prepared in 1991. The draft maps are now being used as bases by the CCOP Working Group on Resource Assessment to compile hydrocarbon resource data, and by the NWQP Working Group on the Geotectonic Map.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90097©1990 Fifth Circum-Pacific Energy and Mineral Resources Conference, Honolulu, Hawaii, July 29-August 3, 1990