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North American Environmental Atlas

Mapping Our Shared Environment

The North American Environmental Atlas combines and harmonizes geospatial data from Canada, Mexico and the United States to allow for a continental and regional perspective on environmental issues that cross boundaries. It is a unique tool to analyze and raise awareness of our shared environment and ecosystems across the continent, to demonstrate their value, and to help us see what needs to be done to protect them.

The dozens of map layers of the Atlas are unique in that they harmonize geographic information across North America’s political boundaries. By comparing these map layers, we can better understand and quantify critical trends and interrelationships at the North American level.

Explore this interactive story for a better understanding of how the Atlas can be useful to you.

Explore more than one thousand publications and articles that utilized data from the North American Environmental Atlas.

North American Environmental Atlas

Keywords

Map Type

Map Files

Atlas map

Elevation, 2023

2023
Ecoregions, Land Cover

The 250m elevation map of North America illustrates the region's terrain in relation to mean sea level, utilizing elevation data sourced from the Global Multi-resolution Terrain Elevation Data 2010 (GMTED2010). This dataset supersedes its predecessor, the 1-km elevation dataset released by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) in 2007, offering heightened topographic detail while maintaining a manageable file size at the North American level.

Atlas Map

North American Lakes and Rivers, 2023

2023
Water

This North American Environmental Atlas dataset displays the coastline, linear hydrographic features (major rivers, streams, and canals), and area hydrographic features (major lakes and reservoirs) of North America at a reference spatial scale of 1:1,000,000.

Atlas Map Layer

Land Cover Change 30m, 2015-2020 (Landsat)

2023
Land Cover

This map demonstrates land cover change between 2015 and 2020 in North America at a spatial resolution of 30 meters.

Land Cover Map

North American Land Cover, 2020 (Landsat, 30m)

2023
Land Cover

This map of North American land cover provides a harmonized view of the physical cover of Earth’s surface across the continent at a spatial resolution of 30 meters, based on Landsat satellite imagery for Canada, Mexico, and the United States.

CEC Atlas Map

Political Boundaries, 2021

2022
Humans

This reference map from the North American Environmental Atlas depicts political entities in North America, with jurisdictional areas represented as polygons and political boundaries, including international boundaries, and provincial, state, or territory boundaries, as lines.

CEC Atlas Map

Population Density, 2020

2022
Humans

This map shows the population density of North America for the year 2020 in number of people per square kilometer within 2.5 arc-minute pixels.

CEC Atlas Map

North American Forests, 2022

2022
Ecoregions

The North American Forest map shows the distribution of eighteen different primary ecological zones pertaining to forest systems within Canada, Mexico, and the United States.

CEC Atlas Map

Terrestrial Ecoregions: Level I

2021
Ecoregions

Ecological regions are areas of general similarity in ecosystems and in the type, quality, and quantity of environmental resources.

CEC Atlas Map

Terrestrial Ecoregions: Level II

2021
Ecoregions

Ecological regions are areas of general similarity in ecosystems and in the type, quality, and quantity of environmental resources.

CEC Atlas Map

Climate Zones of North America

2021
Climate, Ecoregions

The North American Climate Zones map shows the distribution of climate types across Canada, Mexico, and the United States based on the Köppen-Geiger climate classification.

CEC Atlas Map

North American Protected Areas, 2021

2021
Biodiversity, Protected Areas

The new map of North American Protected Areas is an update of the map published in 2017 by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation.

CEC Atlas Map

Terrestrial Ecoregions: Level III

2021
Ecoregions

Ecological regions are areas of general similarity in ecosystems and in the type, quality, and quantity of environmental resources.

Tools

Publications

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