Global Nighttime Lights at ADM2-Level 1992-2013

This table contains yearly nighttime luminosity data for over 39,699 ADM2 areas in 190 countries for the years 1992-2013. The dataset contains names of the country, ADM1, and ADM2 subnational region, the average value of light pixels (mean_light) and the total value of light pixels (sum_light) in the ADM1 region.

Variables:

Countrycode (ISO-3)

Countryname

Name of ADM1 unit

Name of ADM2 unit

mean_light (Mean value of light pixel in ADM2. (Ranges from 0-63))

sum_light (Sum total of individual light pixel values in ADM2)

Data Sources:

The source raster data are geo-tiffs from NOAA’s NGDC Earth Observation Group (EOG): https://ngdc.noaa.gov/eog/

The spatial boundary file is taken from the Global Administrative Boundaries Database: http://gadm.org/. Version 1.0.

Data Processing:

We used the Average Visible, Stable Lights, & Cloud Free Coverages from the DMSP-OLS Nighttime Lights Time Series.

from the DMSP-OLS Nighttime Lights Time Series. In cases where two satellites were collecting data, we used the one collected by the more recent satellite.

The variables “mean_light” and “sum_light” were constructed using the Zonal Statistics tool (Spatial Analyst) from ArcMap 9.3.

We used the Eckert VI equal-area projection.

This dataset was constructed in April 2014.

Citation:

If you are using this data, please use ALL of the following citation:

Original Data:

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). 2014. Version 4 DMSP-OLS Nighttime Lights Time Series. Boulder, CO: National Geophysical Data Center. https://ngdc.noaa.gov/eog/dmsp/downloadV4composites.html. Accessed January 2014.

GADM database of Global Administrative Areas, http://www.gadm.org/, Version 1 Accessed May 2012.

Zonal Statistics Calculations:

Roland Hodler, Paul A. Raschky; Regional Favoritism. The Quarterly Journal of Economics 2014; 129 (2): 995-1033. doi: 10.1093/qje/qju004

Acknowledgement:

This dataset was constructed using financial support from the Australian Research Council (ARC DP120103492).

Download Dataset:

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This data is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.