World Economy As Seen From Space

[OrionHunter]

Reliable data on economic growth is hard to come by in many parts of the world, especially in developing countries. Yet according to scientists, outer space offers a new perspective for measuring economic growth.

Using satellite images of nighttime lights, J. Vernon Henderson, Adam Storeygard, and David N. Weil from Brown University have created a new framework for estimating a country or region’s gross domestic product, or GDP by observing the changes in a country’s “night lights” as seen from outer space.

“Consumption of nearly all goods in the evening requires lights,” they write in a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper. “As income rises, so does light usage per person, in both consumption activities and many investment activities.”

The researchers don’t envision the lights density data as a replacement for official numbers, but when added to existing data from agencies like the World Bank, the lights density can provide a better indicator of how these economies really are performing.

USA and Canada still going strong or are the lights dimming over there?

Absolutely devastating difference between Europe and Africa.

Japan brightly lit, India & China lighting up. The difference between North and South
Korea is stark. Are those people in Australia energy saving perhaps?

South America is lighting up. Including the rain forest?

Source: Futurity.org. Images: Night Satellite Photos. Related: World Mapper: Toys import/exports of the world, If the implications of Global Warming were fair, Constellation, Mapping the DNA world.

And here's the Indo-Pak border fence all lit up, taken by satellite last September....

Delhi and its surrounding areas are toward the top left of the image. Lahore, brightly lit, is seen just below the
fence.

 

[ganesh177]

Right next to india to the north east vast portion of it is dark. Isn't that china ?
Why is it in darkness ?

India looks 100% lightened up, while china looks around 30-40% lightened up. Why is it so ?

 

[Ryuzaki]

Right next to india to the north east vast portion of it is dark. Isn't that china ?
Why is it in darkness ?

India looks 100% lightened up, while china looks around 30-40% lightened up. Why is it so ?

Chinese core is there,Tibet has small population

 

[Koovie]

Right next to india to the north east vast portion of it is dark. Isn't that china ?
Why is it in darkness ?

India looks 100% lightened up, while china looks around 30-40% lightened up. Why is it so ?

Population density

 

[bongbang]

Bangladesh is very bright while you can identify the black hole next to BD as Myanmar.

 

[Menace2Society]

Looks like Indians stay up all night trolling on PDF.

 

[Pakistani till death]

Flew over delhi once and i must say it was the brightest lit city ive ever seen

 

[+4vsgorillas-Apebane]

I like the dark nights when the stars are brightly lit.

Look into the vastness and see how insignificant human existence is.

Right next to india to the north east vast portion of it is dark. Isn't that china ?
Why is it in darkness ?

India looks 100% lightened up, while china looks around 30-40% lightened up. Why is it so ?

Chinese population and industrialization is mainly around the coast. The western interrior is where future economic growth will come from as can be seen by its underdevelopment.

 

[NIA]

Looks like Indians stay up all night trolling on PDF.

You got me there...that wasn't a humor..

 

[WAR-rior]

Flew over delhi once and i must say it was the brightest lit city ive ever seen

Thats coz u never flew over Bombay. And Bombay is known for its night life. The city never sleeps.

 

[Viva India]

The dark patches in USA,Australia and India are desert and China is not evenly populated with all the industrial base limited to East China ...... Not good in terms of nuclear war

 

[OrionHunter]

Looks like Indians stay up all night trolling on PDF.

Epic!!

No wonder there's a fukin' population explosion out here!!

 

[Gibbs]

USA and Canada still going strong or are the lights dimming over there?

Absolutely devastating difference between Europe and Africa.

Japan brightly lit, India & China lighting up. The difference between North and South
Korea is stark. Are those people in Australia energy saving perhaps?

South America is lighting up. Including the rain forest?

The population centers in Australia is basically concentrated on the Eastern and South Eastern coast.. With the exceptions of Perth and may be Darwin.. Hence shown on the map

The center is just a huge red expanse of semi arid desert

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

USA and Canada still going strong or are the lights dimming over there?

That's about right
Population density of the USA

 

[Speeder 2]

Reliable data on economic growth is hard to come by in many parts of the world, especially in developing countries. Yet according to scientists, outer space offers a new perspective for measuring economic growth.

Using satellite images of nighttime lights, J. Vernon Henderson, Adam Storeygard, and David N. Weil from Brown University have created a new framework for estimating a country or region’s gross domestic product, or GDP by observing the changes in a country’s “night lights” as seen from outer space.

“Consumption of nearly all goods in the evening requires lights,” they write in a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper. “As income rises, so does light usage per person, in both consumption activities and many investment activities.”

The researchers don’t envision the lights density data as a replacement for official numbers, but when added to existing data from agencies like the World Bank, the lights density can provide a better indicator of how these economies really are performing.

USA and Canada still going strong or are the lights dimming over there?

Absolutely devastating difference between Europe and Africa.

Japan brightly lit, India & China lighting up. The difference between North and South
Korea is stark. Are those people in Australia energy saving perhaps?

South America is lighting up. Including the rain forest?

Source: Futurity.org. Images: Night Satellite Photos. Related: World Mapper: Toys import/exports of the world, If the implications of Global Warming were fair, Constellation, Mapping the DNA world.

And here's the Indo-Pak border fence all lit up, taken by satellite last September....

Delhi and its surrounding areas are toward the top left of the image. Lahore, brightly lit, is seen just below the
fence.

The OP graph on India is faked!

- or shall I say deliberately arranged vís-a-vís others in order to achieve a centain effect somehow.

The reason is simple - it defies logic and some well-known facts:

1. more than 1/3 of India is in stone-age - has never seen electricity ( a fact from the UN) - it's not shown in the graph.

2. On the contrary it shows that India even had larger lighted area and lighter than East, Middle and South China putting together (actually graph of India was even brighter than Mid and West coast USA putting together), which has electricity usage percap about 6 or 8 times more than India. China's southern industrial hub and night life hub - heavily populated Canton - looked like a half-desert compared to India. The graphs gives a very misleading signal. That is unbelievable as it 's against against some well-established facts. "Population density" alone can not explain this.

3. India has average GDP/cap lower than Africa, and roughly similar population and electricity usage/person as Africa. Yet why so much lightness differences between the two? - another loophole here.

4. Both Thailand and Vietnam have GDP/cap higher than India, and with similar population density. Thailand and Vietnam both have electricity coverage far higher than India. And Thai/Viet, due to cultural and climate reasons, both have far more vibrant night lives than India as generally known to travellers. Yet it is obvious from the the graphs on India VsThailand/Vietnam is like USA Vs Africa, almost completely dark in Thailand /Vietnam. This is just bullsh!t!

5. the single 3 largest and brightest areas were : Western EU, Eastern USA and India - one doesn't need to reach 85 IQ to see that is so fake!

6. the south borders of the Hymalayas - the northern part of India and South Tibet were brighter and much more densely lit than the entire South China - the industrial/manufacture hub of China and the world! Are the author/s of the graphs the same ones as those who made Youtube vid where the Whites serving India in 2035? because they seem to share the similar mentalities.

... there're many other discrepancies as well.

Hence, for one reason or another, the OP graphs, and/or the original source of them, have been badly tempered by some people to serve a certain purpose.


more on this:

one of the easiest tricks to temper the graphs is -

deliberately choose different timings for different regions, to take advantages of differences on time zones (many even on seasons as well), day-light saving schemes that some countries are adapting, and regional cultural norm differences, etc to reach some misconceptions that the authors of the graphs want to propagate.

Yet either way no matter how one chooses different times, that almost entire India was very brightly and densely lit like a shopping mall Christmas tree at any particular time is just impossible, except that some obvious photoshopping was applied.