Deferred providers#
Some data sources were evaluated and deliberately not integrated into earthlens. They are listed here so the project surface stays honest: these are known and considered, not overlooked. The usual reasons are a licence trap (non-commercial / restricted redistribution), no stable programmatic access (no API or no maintained Python client), or commercial-only access.
If you need one of these datasets, follow the manual route in its row. Always confirm the current licence and terms on the provider's own site before use — terms change, and the notes below reflect the state at evaluation time, not a legal guarantee.
Summary#
| Provider | Domain | Why deferred | How to get the data |
|---|---|---|---|
| GVP (Smithsonian Global Volcanism Program) | Volcanoes / eruptions | Reference database, no stable bulk API / maintained Python client; reuse is attribution-bound | Browse or export from the Volcanoes of the World site; a WFS/GeoServer endpoint exists for one-off pulls |
| GRDC (Global Runoff Data Centre) | River discharge (in-situ) | Restricted access — data requires a formal request/agreement; no anonymous bulk download; redistribution limited | Submit a data request via the GRDC portal and download the granted station files manually |
| IBAT (Integrated Biodiversity Assessment Tool) | Protected areas / KBA / Red List | Commercial / subscription for most access tiers; free tier is limited and NC | Use an IBAT subscription; for the underlying open layers use earthlens.wdpa (Protected Planet) and earthlens.iucn instead |
| Map of Life (MoL) | Species range maps | Per-dataset licensing; many layers are NC / research-only | Use the Map of Life portal / its API under the specific dataset's terms; for open occurrences use earthlens.gbif / earthlens.obis |
| IQAir (AirVisual) | Air quality (ground) | Commercial API with paid tiers; free tier heavily rate-limited; redistribution restricted | Use the paid IQAir/AirVisual API; for open AQ use earthlens.openaq |
| Renewables.ninja | Solar / wind power time series | CC-BY-NC (non-commercial) + rate-limited; academic use | Register at renewables.ninja and pull per-site series under the NC licence; for open solar/wind resource use earthlens.pvgis / earthlens.nrel / earthlens.solar_wind_atlas |
Notes#
- NC (non-commercial) sources — MoL (many layers), Renewables.ninja, and IBAT's free tier — are excluded from the default integration path because earthlens makes no assumption about a user's commercial status. Where an open-licensed alternative covers the same need, it is named in the table (e.g. WDPA/IUCN for protected areas, GBIF/OBIS for occurrences, OpenAQ for air quality, PVGIS/NREL for renewables).
- Restricted-access sources — GRDC — cannot be wrapped behind an anonymous
download()because access is gated by an individual agreement; a backend would only ever hold a per-user credential with redistribution constraints, which does not fit earthlens's "fetch and hand back the data" contract. - No-stable-client sources — GVP — could be revisited if a maintained API/Python client and clear bulk-reuse terms appear.
These deferrals are tracked as L15 in the low-tier roadmap. Re-evaluate a row if its licence or access model
changes.