Information Products
Want to learn more about our planet or how we’re doing here in Hawai‘i? Below are resources provided by a variety of government agencies and partnerships that can help you learn more about the environment, climate science, and the variety of systems of which we are a part in addition to data and information about our local situation.
Local Resources
The Hawaii Climate Change Portal is where you can find information specific to our state regarding mitigation and adaptation goals, status information, tools, and more:
Hawaii Climate Change Portal Hawaiʻi’s Climate Commission recognizes the urgency of climate threats and the need to act quickly. It promotes ambitious, climate-neutral, culturally responsive strategies for climate change adaptation and mitigation in a manner that is clean, equitable, and resilient.
In response to the Paris Agreement, Hawaiʻi created the Hawaiʻi Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation Commission (Commission). The Commission’s priorities are captured in its two statements, on ground transportation emissions reduction and adaptation to sea level rise, including disaster recovery preparedness. As a member of the U.S. Climate Alliance, we believe that smart, coordinated State action can ensure that the U.S. continues to contribute to the global effort to address climate change.
[from the Hawaii Climate Change Portal]
The Aloha+ Challenge is where you can find data and information regarding our state’s progress in relation to a subset of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals.
The Aloha+ Challenge is a statewide public-private commitment to achieve Hawai‘i's social, economic, and environmental goals by 2030.
Launched in 2014, the Aloha+ Challenge identified six priority goals and local metrics that are delivering against the global United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The Hawai‘i Green Growth Local 2030 Hub and partners are catalyzing island-led solutions to drive concrete action. Explore the Aloha+ Dashboard to see statewide progress and benchmark data on the Aloha+ SDGs and Hawai‘i's contribution to the global goals.
[from the Aloha+ Website]
The Department of Land and Natural Resources offers a variety of informational resources that can help you better understand your specific context — risks and resources.
This Wai Halana 2022 blog post from provides descriptions and links to the variety of map tools available to help assess flood risks. There are many tools available ranging from flood plain information for real estate assessment to tsunami evacuation zones. For inundation areas due to sea level rise, check out this Pacific Islands Ocean Observing System (PacIOOS) site. More information about that tool is available on both the Wai Halana blog post and the PacIOOS website.
Another recent map tool is the Tree Canopy Viewer. This is an ongoing DLNR project with the USDA Forest Service. You can read more about it at the DLNR Tree Canopy Viewer site. The map also provides overlays such as a heat index map, community demographics, and health issues.
The University of Hawaii systems and partners have a variety of programs that develop resources and products that can provide you a deeper understanding of our environment:
The overarching goal of the HCDP is to provide streamlined access to high-quality reliable climate data and information for the State of Hawai‘i. This includes the production of both near-real-time monthly rainfall and daily temperature maps and a user-friendly tool to visualize and download them. Easy access to high quality climate data, information and products through the HCDP allows researchers to focus more time on their analyses and less time on data collection and processing. It also provides the broader community with access to information that would otherwise be inaccessible due to technical limitations. Finally, centralizing data and information helps to create more of a holistic environment for environmental stewardship in Hawai‘i.
Founded in 1968, the University of Hawaiʻi Sea Grant College Program (Hawaiʻi Sea Grant) is part of a national network of 33 programs that promote better understanding, conservation, and use of coastal resources. Hawaiʻi Sea Grant works in partnership with the University of Hawaiʻi’s prestigious School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to identify Hawaiʻi’s critical resource management issues and guide cutting-edge scientific research to address these challenges.
The Coral Health Atlas provides easily accessible data, immersive visual displays, and general information for study sites throughout the Hawaiian Archipelago. We hope to promote a global understanding of the importance of healthy coral reefs in order to protect and conserve these precious ecosystems.
Pacific Island Climate Adaptation Science Center
The Pacific Islands Climate Adaptation Science Center (PI-CASC) is a collaborative partnership between the US Geological Survey and a university consortium hosted by the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, with the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo and the University of Guam, designed to support sustainability and climate adaptation in communities across the Pacific Islands.
The Hawai‘i State Energy Office (HSEO) provides information on Hawai‘i’s energy use. HSEO has also created a data dashboard across numerous measures ranging that includes the cost of petroleum, electricity consumption by agency, and estimated vehicle emissions. See more at the Energy Data Portal.
HSEO fulfills its mission to residents through strategy and thought leadership; program design and implementation; analysis, reporting, and data collection and sharing; regulatory support; and education, outreach, and community/public engagement.
The Hawai‘i Wildfire Management Organization provides resources and information on wildfire hazards and their impacts on Hawai‘i and our environment. Sign up for alerts, learn how to make your area more fire-resilient, and learn about the ongoing drought conditions.
National Resources
Some U.S. government agencies provide informational resources, data and tools to help you learn about our ecosystems and natural resources in addition to climate science. Many offer teaching resources, media products, online talks/webinars among other opportunities for learning:
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) NOAA is an agency that enriches life through science. Our reach goes from the surface of the sun to the depths of the ocean floor as we work to keep the public informed of the changing environment around them.
Mission: To understand and predict changes in climate, weather, oceans, and coasts, to share that knowledge and information with others, and to conserve and manage coastal and marine ecosystems and resources.
NOAA Climate From supercomputers and state-of-the-art models to observations and outlooks, we provide data, tools, and information to help people understand and prepare for climate variability and change.
NOAA Climate.gov provides timely and authoritative information about climate. We promote public understanding of climate science and climate-related events through videos, stories, images, and data visualizations; we make common data products and services easy to access and use; and we provide tools and resources that help people make informed decisions about climate risks, vulnerability, and resilience.
NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) hosts and provides public access to one of the most significant archives for environmental data on Earth. We provide over 37 petabytes of comprehensive atmospheric, coastal, oceanic, and geophysical data.
U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) We provide science about the natural hazards that threaten lives and livelihoods, the water, energy, minerals, and other natural resources we rely on, the health of our ecosystems and environment, and the impacts of climate and land-use change. Our scientists develop new methods and tools to enable timely, relevant, and useful information about the Earth and its processes.
Mission Areas Changes to the natural world combined with growing human demands put our health and safety, national security, and economy at risk. We are focused on some of the most significant issues society faces, and our science is making a substantial contribution to the well-being of the Nation and the world. Learn more about the major topics our research covers and the programs focused on those topic
Climate Adaptation Science Centers From the expansion of invasive species to wildfire, from drought to sea-level rise, climate change creates new and evolving challenges for ecosystems across the nation. The USGS National and Regional Climate Adaptation Science Centers (CASCs) is a partnership-driven program that teams scientific researchers with natural and cultural resource managers and local communities to help fish, wildlife, waters, and lands across the country adapt to changing conditions.
Earth Resources Observation and Science Center At the USGS EROS Center, we study land change and produce land change data products used by researchers, resource managers, and policy makers across the nation and around the world. We also operate the Landsat satellite program with NASA, and maintain the largest civilian collection of images of the Earth’s land surface in existence, including tens of millions of satellite images.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is America’s civil space program and the global leader in space exploration. The agency has a diverse workforce of just under 18,000 civil servants, and works with many more U.S. contractors, academia, and international and commercial partners to explore, discover, and expand knowledge for the benefit of humanity.
NASA Landsat Science The Landsat program offers the longest continuous global record of the Earth's surface; it continues to deliver visually stunning and scientifically valuable images of our planet.
Visible Earth The Landsat satellite record stretches from 1972 to the present. This gallery includes all Landsat images published on the Earth Observatory, Visible Earth, and Landsat Science web sites from all seven Landsat satellites (Landsats 1-8, Landsat 6 failed to achieve orbit).
NASA Earth Observatory The Earth Observatory’s mission is to share with the public the images, stories, and discoveries about the environment, Earth systems, and climate that emerge from NASA research, including its satellite missions, in-the-field research, and models.
Earth Shots (under USGS EROS) The surface of the Earth is always changing. Some changes like earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, and landslides happen quickly and other changes, such as most erosional processes, happen slowly over time. It’s often hard to see these changes from ground level. A much broader view is needed, and multiple views that provide a record of change over time are especially helpful. Earthshots shows you how satellite data are used to track these changes.