Skip to Main Content

Data Resources and Support

Support for locating and working with datasets, statistical information, and geographic data.

Environment

British Petroleum Statistical Review of World Energy -- The Statistical Review of World Energy is a very good source for international time-series data on energy production and consumption, with a collection of downloadable data here.

Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC) -- The CDIAC is an excellent source for comprehensive data on climate change and related matters. Users may be especially interested in the CDIAC Catalog, which includes much historical data on CO2 emissions as well as historical data on average temperatures. Note that the contents of the site are gradually being transitioned to other locations.

Climate Data Online -- The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Data Online site is an access to climate data maintained by the National Centers for Environmental Information. You can access data collected via means such as land-based monitoring stations, satellites, or sea-based observation stations, measuring topics such as temperature and amount of sunlight and amount of precipitation. The Quick Links and the Products will take you to many of the available data collections.

Department of Energy Energy Information Administration (EIA) -- The EIA is a very extensive source for data on energy consumption in the United States, with both annual and monthly data available. The EIA also has a collection of "navigators" with additional data on various categories of energy, such as the Petroleum Navigator that includes national and state-level data on prices, production, and consumption. The EIA also has much international data available.

Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture -- ERS provides economic and other information and analysis on agriculture,, food consumption and access, international trade, and rural areas.

Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT) -- EM-DAT provides data on sizes of affected populations from different categories of diasters, both natural (e.g. floods, landslides, earthquakes, drought) and technological/human-made (e.g. industrial accidents, transporation accidents). You can query the data or request access to the complete database.

EJScreen: Environmental Justice Screening and Mapping Tool -- The Environmental Protection Agency's EJScreen "is an environmental justice mapping and screening tool that provides EPA with a nationally consistent dataset and approach for combining environmental and demographic indicators." The data cover topics such as air quality, traffic proximity, environmental hazards, and waste and are at the level of Census block groups. See https://www.epa.gov/ejscreen/understanding-ejscreen-results for the available environmental and demographic data and constructed indices. There is a mapping tool for the data, and the data are also available for download.

Environmental Performance Index (EPI) -- Yale University's Environmental Performance Index scores countries in two main areas of environmental performance: protection of human health and protection of ecosystems. Countries are further scored on sub-categories such as air quality, biodiversity, forests, and water resources. There are various tools to rank and compare countries' index scores, and the EPI data are also available for download. Data from this project are also available via Columbia University's Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center. The EPI data are also included within the Quality of Government Institute's Standard Data.

Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) -- The ESI is a project of Yale University and Columbia University that scores and ranks countries on their abilities to provide long-term environment protection. Data from ESI reports are available in both .pdf and Excel formats.

Environmental Sustainability -- This site, which is hosted by Columbia's Socioeconomic Applications and Data Center, compiles links to various sources for data and other sources on sustainability. Be sure to check out SEDAC's other data resources for data on other environment-related topics such as climate, environmental governance, land use, and water resources.

Environmental Treaties and Resources Indicators (ENTRI) -- ENTRI is a searchable database of environmental treaties that allows users to create profiles of particular countries with regard to environmental treaties and agreements. Users can also search for treaties by topic of coverage and search through or browse full texts of treaties.

Paul Hensel's International Environmental Data Page -- This site, which is hosted by Dr. Paul Hensel, contains links to data on a variety of environmental topics such as fisheries, energy, water disputes, and agricultural production.

International Environmental Agreements (IEA) Database Project -- The University of Oregon's IEA Database Project is compiling information on multilateral and bilateral environmental agreements to identify membership in those agreements and code the contents of those agreements in terms of areas covered and legal provisions within them. The data collected and coded by this project are intended for use in measuring the effects of such agreements on environmental outcomes.

International Monetary Fund Climate Change Dashboard -- The IMF's Climate Change Dashboard includes "a range of distinctive indicators that demonstrate the impact economic activity is having on climate change. These indicators have been grouped into five categories: Economic Activity, Cross-Border, Financial and Risks, Government Policy, and Climate Change Data." Unlike all too many dashboards, the data for this dashboard are readily available to download.

International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources Red List of Endangered Species -- The IUCN's Red List of Endangered Species allows users to create lists and summaries of endangered or threatened species by taxonomy, extent of threat, and/or geography (e.g. countries, maritime regions).

National Agricultural Statistics Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (NASS) -- NASS is a good source for very detailed data on agricultural production and economics, including data from the Census of Agriculture

National Surveys on Energy and the Environment, [United States], Fall 2008-Fall 2017 -- The National Surveys on Energy and Environment (NSEE)was "an on-going biannual national opinion survey on energy and climate policy. Launched in 2008, over time the NSEE has covered topics such as public policy approaches to address climate change including federal, state, and international action; energy policies such as cap-and-trade, carbon taxes, renewable energy requirements, vehicle emissions standards, and many more; and knowledge and attitudes about global warming, climate adaptation, fracking, and geoengineering." The data available here include "data from eighteen waves, from Fall 2008 through Fall 2017. Demographic variables include age, years of education completed, income, political affiliation, religious affiliation, gender, and race." Data from individual waves are also available via openICPSR and via the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research. If you need to access the ICPSR and its data from off of campus, please see this notice and these instructions from the ICPSR.

Quality of Government Environmental Indicators Dataset (QoG-EI) -- The QoG-EI data from the Quality of Government Institute "include the presence and strictness of environmental policies, the level of pressure on the environment (such as ecological footprint and emission levels), and public opinion on the environmental matters. The dataset also includes background geographical data such as the annual average rainfall and the size of land area, among others."

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law -- The Sabin Center for Climate Change Law "develops legal techniques to fight climate change, trains law students and lawyers in their use, and provides the public with up-to-date resources on key topics in climate law and regulation." The Center's resources include a collection of databases on topics such as climate change legislation, climate deregulation, climate change litigation, and efforts to censor scientific research related to climate change.

United Nations Environmental Programme Data Portal -- To quote the website, the UNEP's internal and external data portals provide access to "high quality geospatial data sets at various scales (global, continental, national and subnational) on a variety of environment related themes." The available themes/topics include the likes of freshwater, population, forests, emissions, climate, disasters, and health. Researchers are able to download the data in multiple formats.

United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Statistics -- The FAO is a UN organization that is ostensibly devoted to alleviating world hunger. The FAO's collection of statistics and databases covers a variety of topics, such as water, agricultural production, and agricultural consumption. The geographic and time coverage vary by topic and database. Users can query the databases to create extracts of data of interest or can download the data in bulk.

World Bank Environment -- This World Bank site contains links to various resources, including collections of environmental data and statistics. The Bank also produces more specialized data collections, such as the Wealth of Nations data on the sustainability of countries' growth trajectories and the Adjusted Net Savings data that incorporate the effects of environmental depletion. See also the environmental data section within the Bank's data collections.

World Bank Environment, Social and Governance Data -- The World Bank's ESG data provide "information on 17 key sustainability themes spanning environmental, social, and governance categories." The data are available via bulk download or via the Bank's DataBank platform.

World Resources Institute - Maps & Data -- The World Resources Institute has compiled a variety of data resources on topics such as emissions, locations of power stations, usage of clean technologies, and agriculture. See also the WRI's Data Lab with its various data platforms and datasets.