Explaining the Causes of Famine

Voice of America has used a series of Google Maps and over 10,000 separate data points on rainfall, food prices and refugee movement to explain How Somalia Descended into Famine.

The visualisation explains over a series of Google Maps how the non-occurence of last year's rain season in Somalia has led to crop failure, this year's spike in food prices and then widespread famine.

The rainfall map lets the user view rainfall levels throughout Somalia. If you click on one of the rainfall markers you can view a graph of rainfall at that location comparing 2010's rainfall with rainfall in 2009.

The food prices map allows the user to select different towns in Somalia and view graphs showing the sharp rise in price of a number of different crops and other essential commodities.

Finally the famine map provides a heat map of Somalia showing the scale of the famine at different locations in the country.

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Google Map of Pollution Emissions

Sandbag Emissions Map

The Sandbag Emissions Map is a Google Map that allows you to explore how the emissions trading system is operating in the European Union. Since 2005, factories and power stations have been subject to legal caps on their emissions. To comply with these caps, participants must submit pollution permits to match their emissions.

The Sandbag Emissions Map helps to show how much is being emitted, by whom and how many permits they were given. In 2009 emissions fell below the caps leaving 70% of sites with more permits than they need (coloured red on the map). The power station and factory icons shown on the map are scaled according to the size of the businesses' emissions.

You can search the map by postcode, CITL sector code and installation name. A company level search is also in development and will be available soon.

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Tracking Your Clothes with Google Maps

Rapanui

Eco-fashion retailer Rapanui is using Google Maps to help inform customers about the carbon footprint of each of their products. The map allows users to investigate the complete supply chain of products from source to dispatch.

The maps shows where the raw materials are obtained and the energy used in their production. The map then shows the distance the products travel and the mode of transport used in their shipping.

Rapanui say that you can view a Google Map showing the complete supply chain for every one of their men's and women's products.

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Mapping the Trees of San Francisco

Urban Forest Map

The Urban Forest Map is a Google Map application that is trying to map every tree in San Francisco.

One aim of the map is to calculate the environmental benefits the trees are providing, how many gallons of stormwater they are helping to filter, how many pounds of air pollutants they are capturing, how many kilowatt-hours of energy they are conserving, and how many tons of carbon dioxide they are removing from the atmosphere.

Using the map it is possible to search for trees near any location in San Francisco. You can find trees that bear edible fruits and nuts or those with beautiful flowers. You can also search the map for trees of a particular type.

Looking at the map you can see that the Urban Forest Map already has a huge database of trees in San Francisco but if you know of one that is missing you can add it to the map.

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