Public Data Repositories
Atlas of the Biosphere
In this website you will find maps of environmental variables, human impacts, and land use. If you use anything from the Atlas in a publication, please use the following citation: "Used by permission of The Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison"
Data Basin
The core of Data Basin is free and provides open access to thousands of scientifically-grounded, biological, physical, and socio-economic datasets.
National Renewable Energy Laboratory
NREL's Geographic Information System (GIS) team analyzes renewable energy resources and many other data sources to determine which energy technologies are viable solutions across the globe and inputs the data into a geographic information system.
Species Distributions
NatureServe compiles and maintains extensive data on the animals of the United States, Canada, and the entire Western Hemisphere. These data focus on the taxonomy, natural history, distribution, and conservation status of vertebrates and selected invertebrates. The following downloadable datasets are available here:
The National Atlas
All raw data contained in the National Altas is available for downloading including everything from agricultural census data, presidential election results, airports, railways, glaciers, arsenic content in groundwater, and much more.
U.S. Energy Information
Datasets on Energy Sources within the United States. Covers Coal, Natural Gas, Oil Wells, Electricity and Nuclear, and Renewable Sources.
United State Census
TIGER = Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing TIGER products are spatial extracts from the Census Bureau's MAF/TIGER database, containing features such as roads, railroads, rivers, as well as legal and statistical geographic areas. The Census Bureau offers several file types and an online mapping application.
WorldClim
WorldClim is a set of global climate layers (climate grids) with a spatial resolution of about 1 square kilometer. The data can be used for mapping and spatial modeling in a GIS or with other computer programs
