Google Earth offers bird's eye view of US emissions

US businesses can now easily track pollution from their facilities and could soon be able to compare the carbon footprint of different streets, following the launch this week of a new interactive map of carbon emissions on Google Earth.

The new application, which is based on maps and data compiled as part of the NASA-backed Vulcan project to better track US carbon emissions, allows users to view carbon emissions from factories, power plants, roads, and residential and commercial areas and compare their region's performance with other parts of the country.

Simon Ilyushchenko, an engineer at Google who worked on integrating the carbon emission data from the Vulcan Project with Google Earth, said that the application should help encourage businesses and individuals to take action to cut emissions.

"Vulcan had great information, but it was not easy for a non-scientist to analyse and understand," he said, adding that by providing dynamic maps of the data, users will be able to easily track where "people burn more gasoline from driving or where they use more fuel for heating and cooling homes and businesses ".

The new application was welcomed by Kevin Gurney, leader of the Vulcan project at Purdue University, who said that as his team develops more granular data, it should be possible for users to track the emissions of individual streets and buildings.

"This is the first step," he said. "We'll keep adding more information to enrich it. We hope to eventually get feedback from the public about energy use and activity that allows us to include even more detailed information."

The application, which Gurney said could be extended to cover Mexico and Canada, raises the prospect of customers being able to easily track and compare the carbon emissions of their suppliers and partners.

Google Earth could also serve to help shape climate change policy, according to Peter Griffith, director of NASA's Carbon Cycle and Ecosystems Office which part-funds the Vulcan Project. "One of the goals of the US Climate Change Science Program is to assist with scientifically based formulation of policy and decision making," he said. "By allowing non-specialists to see changes in carbon dioxide emissions in time and across broad areas, we are helping them to understand critical information for climate change policy decisions."