Population Distribution [63]

The world's 6 billion+ people are by no means spread out equally over the globe's territories — yet continental lines are easily identifiable since people seem to prefer coastal regions for settlements. More than half of the world's population lives on a relatively small territory spreading from northern India to China.

Land Mines [67]

Red indicates countries where mines are in use; countries identified with the letter "M" are major producers of land mines.

Global Warming and Cooling [158]

1965 -1995 data: temperature changes over a 30-year period. Areas that experienced a temperature increase of up to 0.5ºC are white. Areas in which the temperature increased 0.6º - 1.0ºC are pink, and temperature increases of 1,1º - 1.5ºC are red. All areas in which the temperature decreased are shown in blue, equally bracketed.

Extended Exclusive Maritime Economic Zones [107]

According to the proposed, and heavily debated, International Maritime Law, nations may extend their exclusive economic jurisdiction 200 miles (370 km) into the seas. This law would roughly double the amount of the earth's surface available for exclusive economic development. Given that the rest of the oceans is subject to non-exclusive exploitation, only the seas beneath the ice caps would be effectively protected.

Fresh Water [3]

97.4 % of the world's water is ocean water. 2 % is accounted for by ice caps and glaciers, and about 0.6 % is ground water, which constitutes the entire fresh water reserves on earth. Lake water represents only 7 millionths of the world's water; clouds only 1 millionth, and river water 10% of a millionth.

Ocean Floor [5]

Eighty-five percent of the earth’s volcanic eruptions occur deep underwater along mid-ocean ridges.

Landlocked Nations [7]

These countries have one territorial condition in common: no access to the world's oceans. This has a fundamental impact on economics, social behavior, and perspective on the world. Many of the republics of the former Soviet Union are landlocked. Their recent independence has radically increased the number of countries, that suffer this unique condition.

Life Expectancy [8]

Life expectancy is a core indicator in the UN’s human development index. Japan has the highest life expectancy at 82 years. More than 30 of the countries with the lowest life expectancy are in Sub-Saharan Africa: here life expectancy averages 46 years.

Solar Exposure [321]

The brighter the area the more sunshine it receive. Bright yellow areas are ideal for Solar Thermal Power (CST) generation.

Enclaves and Special Zones [245-2]

Special Economic Zones are a type of proto-state. They function as adapters zones to globalism. Ideally they are stripped of cultural, local, national, linguistic, fiduciary, monetary, regulatory, ethnic, and social barriers, idiosyncrasies, identities, and flavors. These Nationettes are run by corporations, governments, authorities, or organizations. At the same time they are incubators for new arrangements, agreements and contracts of social, commercial, and industrial infrastructure in a networked world. A network of SEZs would represent a structurally new, highly fluid state morphology - the antithesis to the nation state concept of the early 19th century.

Foreign Aid [247]

Thicker lines drawn from captial to capital indicate aidflow in excess of 66 million dollars per year. Thinner lines represent the 20 to 66 million bracket. Smaller amounts have generally been ignored unless they represent a significant portion of the donor country's budget.

Rainfall [233]

As drawn according to rainfall, a picture of our “waterworld” reveals contours that are subtly influenced by continental masses, but not beholden geography in any way whatsoever. Darkest regions receive on average more than 2000 millimeters of rain annually while white regions receive less than 100 millimeters. Arabian peninsular shown in the center of the perspective.